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THE 

TOWN LANDING 


BY 


MABEL FARNUM 



NEW YORK 

P. J. KENEDY & SONS 

1923 




















Copyright, 1923, by 
P. J. KENEDY & SONS 
Printed in the U. S. A. 



JAN 10 *24 


©ClA7Ce738 




\ 


. Z ‘f 


CONTENTS 


i. 


CHAPTER PAGE 

I. A Face in the Lamplight.1 

II. Mrs. Tomer’s Boarding House . . .13 

III. The First Day of May.26 

IV. A Funny Old World.89 

V. Why Can’t We Be Happy?.50 

VI. In Which Nothing Happens .... 60 

VII. The Spell of Beauty.67 

VIII. A Message from Home.78 

IX. Is There a Heaven?.88 

X. Francis and Barbara.95 

XI. David Dreams of a Little Princess . .109 

XII. Gingerbread at Hillcrest.121 

XIII. The Doll’s House.135 

XIV. Curing the Physician.139 

XV. A Breath of Incense.154 

XVI. The Old Buzz Wagon.165 

XVII. Days at the Old Home.180 

XVIII. Hillcrest.193 

XIX. Partners.200 

XX. The Town Landing.215 

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THE TOWN LANDING 


I 

"A FACE IN THE LAMPLIGHT 

^‘XTTEY, mister; give us a shot?’’ Without 
f § waiting for the desired permission the 
small urchin astride the iron fence that 
separated the Old Granary Burying Grounds 
from the busy thoroughfare of Tremont Street 
directed an apple core with professional curve at 
his chosen target, one of two young men who 
were walking slowly along in the quiet of early 
evening. 

“Look here, young chap! If I wanted to soil 
my hands with you ...” The irate and fastidi¬ 
ous Dr. Francis Somers wiped the remains of 
the none too wholesome apple from his coat 
collar and lifted his walking stick vengefully in 
the direction of—nothing more than the afore¬ 
mentioned iron fence. 

“Where did the rascal go, anyhow? I’ve a 
good mind to jump over that fence and catch 
him and-” 




2 


THE TOWN LANDING 


‘‘Oh, come on! What good would it do? Poor 
little beggar! It’s just his way of expressing 
himself, that’s all.” And George Barrows, the 
doctor’s genial companion, swung him by the 
arm into a livelier pace as they passed on their 
way toward the Common. 

“If I had caught him,” muttered Francis, 
whose immaculate attire had suffered somewhat 
from the encounter, “I would have- Expres¬ 

sion! I’d give him something expressive.” 

“But, my dear fellow,” responded Barrows, 
“you’ve added somewhat to the joy of living for 
that little urchin. From the looks of him he 
hasn’t too much of it. I imagine that he lives 
somewhere in the West End and just came up 
here for excitement and to see what’s going on. 
You see, he wasn’t exactly looking for anything 
particular. Just something by way of diversion. 
Your appearance seemed to strike him. You 
know, you’re rather well put together, if you 
don’t mind my saying so, Francis. I don’t 
wonder sick folks usually manage to have a long 
convalescence under your tender treatment. I’d 
say that this little shaver showed discrimination 
when he picked you from the crowd. Now, 
honestly — you know you’re unusual, don’t 
you?” 

“Oh, come now, George!” But Francis was 



A FACE IN THE LAMPLIGHT 


3 


mollified by the compliment. “What do you say 
to a stroll along the Esplanade? It’s a wonder¬ 
ful night. We can cut across Beacon Street. By 
the way, I don’t know but there is something in 
what you said about expressing one’s self. We 
all have to find a way. Of course, the little 
chap ...” 

The two friends continued on their way, chat¬ 
ting pleasantly. They passed through Biver 
Street, turned the corner by the little antique 
shop, and were swinging toward the river when 
Francis noticed a small boy vainly endeavoring 
to reach the doorbell of a red brick apartment. 

“Hi, mister! Please ring the bell for me? I 
ain’t quite tall enough.” 

Dr. Somers, edified that he seemed to be the 
favorite picked every time for the bestowal of 
delicate attentions on the part of small urchins, 
strode lightly up the steps and pulled the bell 
benignantly. 

“Hoorah! Now yuh better run for dear life, 
mister. I don’t want anything. I’m just around 
ringin’ doorbells.” 

As the generous peal reverberated through the 
quiet street sundry heads appeared in adjacent 
doorways and windows. Francis colored and bit 
his lip with annoyance. 

“Did you say—expression?” he asked as he 



4 


THE TOWN LANDING 


stood on the doorstep looking blankly around for 
a glimpse of the small boy, who had disappeared 
as if by magic. 

“You wished to see someone in the house, sir?” 
A very charming young person had appeared in 
answer to the summons and stood waiting for 
Dr. Somers to proffer an explanation. 

“Why—why—” The young person was cer¬ 
tainly very attractive, and for the moment she 
quite took all thought of the doorbell from 
Francis’ mind. Fortunately his friend came to 
the rescue. 

“You see, we just made a mistake, that’s all,” 
he explained with tactful courtesy. “We are not 
familiar with the neighborhood. It’s a beautiful 
evening, isn’t it? Nice locality this, near the 
river. Thank you.” 

The young person looked as if she was only 
too willing to pardon a mistake made by such 
very agTeeable young men, and with evident re¬ 
gret written all over her pretty face suffered 
them to depart. 

Francis was silent for a few moments. His 
companion said: 

“Just another form of expression, that.” 

“Eh? What? Yes, I’ll say her expression was 
—was-” 

“Was—what?” suggested George, inwardly 




A FACE IN THE LAMPLIGHT 


5 


amused by the evident trend of Francis’ 
thoughts. 

“Was—^well, you know what I mean, or if you 
don’t you are a mole or an ostrich. She was very 
soothing to the eyes, that’s all.” 

“Ah! Now I understand. Yes. And she 
evidently has discrimination, too. It was plain 
to see that she was willing to pardon your 
mistake.” 

Francis colored again and changed the subject • 
abruptly. 

The two friends walked arm in arm along the 
Esplanade. It was too early in the season to 
tempt many pedestrians to face the brisk east 
winds. Only now and then a solitary figure hud¬ 
dled in a warm wrap passed them. 

In the early evening the water looked cruel. A 
sheet of seething cold gray steel, it lapped 
greedily at the huge stone piers. The lifeboats 
were as yet swathed in their winter coverings, 
and the tiny teahouse over the way was tightly 
barred and boarded until the summer season. 
And yet Nature was appealing even in her stern 
and aggressive mood. 

To the left of the Esplanade stretched an un¬ 
ending chain of red brick apartments, the homes 
of privileged children of fortune. Most of these 
dwellings, glimpsed from the rear, were enclosed 


6 


THE TOWN LANDING 


by high brick walls over which, a little later, all 
kinds of fragrant growths would twine in beau¬ 
teous profusion. They stretched away as far as 
the eye could see. Directly across the glittering 
water, to the right, was the bridge over which 
passed a ceaseless stream of vehicles of every de¬ 
scription, drays, trams, railway cars and auto¬ 
mobiles—going to and from the city. In the dis- 
tanee they looked like a train of toys which a 
child strews about the floor, and moves about to 
suit his fancy. 

Directly in front, where the gray river melted 
into the horizon, against the far blue hills of 
cloud, rose the red tiled roofs of the Passionist 
Monastery, its white cloisters standing out in 
picturesque relief against the opalescent sky. 
The sight suggested something very soothing, 
not alone to the eye, but to the soul of George 
Barrows, who was a fervent Catholic. He lifted 
his hat, and his lips moved for an instant. 

Doctor Somers, whose sensitive soul keenly 
appreciated beauty, although he was not a re¬ 
ligious man, looked toward the peaceful outline 
of the monastery roof, and sighed deeply, while 
a dreamy expression crept into his fine eyes. 

He said: “It’s certainly good to leave the 
madding throng for a brief hour and to steal 
away like this. Tennyson must have felt that 



A FACE IN THE LAMPLIGHT 


7 


way, I think, from certain passages in the 'Idylls 
of the King.’ I imagine that he, like many 
others, longed to escape from the incessant 
motion of the world and people in it, to steal 
away 'to where, beyond these voices, there is 
peace.’ I sometimes wish that I were away from 
it all. It’s really getting on my nerves. The 
craze for speed seems to be an insatiable weak¬ 
ness of men to-day. I hate the streets—al¬ 
though, of course, I love my work. There’s a 
lot of happiness to be found in helping other 
people, especially those in pain.” 

“To express themselves?” suggested Barrows 
with a smile. 

“Well, then, yes. If there were not something 
more than the mere easing of physical pains, I’d 
be sick of it, I imagine. But when you connect 
this intricate machinery with the motive power, 
and watch it when it begins to work smoothly 
and give off steam, so to speak, there’s something 
behind it that makes it absorbing. It’s the soul of 
the thing, I suppose.” 

The two men passed back through the con¬ 
gested streets of the West End and turning 
abruptly around by McLean Street, came upon 
old St. Joseph’s Church nestling on the corner 
with its peaceful and friendly outline, solitary 
and inviting. 



8 


THE TOWN LANDING 


“If you don’t mind going on alone, I guess ’ll 
drop in here for a while,” George Barrows said. 
“Or, if you’d like to, come in and wait. 
No? Well, then, I’ll see you to-morrow 
night.” 

Doctor Somers, continuing on his way, 
thought seriously of his friend’s action in stop¬ 
ping to enter the quiet and apparently aban¬ 
doned church. 

“I wonder what he wanted in there at this 
time of the day,” he soliloquized. “Because there’s 
nobody there.” 

It was twilight when Francis reached his 
apartment on Bowdoin Street just across from 
the State House. He stood for a few moments 
in the open doorway before entering. It was a 
still evening, indicative of the near advent of 
May and the first breath of flowers. 

Noises of the city were subdued at the mo¬ 
ment: the far-off wail of an engine, factory 
whistles, cries of children playing late in the 
streets, discordant and merry, languid voices of 
old men discussing the day’s affairs over the 
evening pipe in doorways, soft tones of women 
exchanging bits of news from upper-story win¬ 
dows, hoarse shouts of venders about to lay aside 
their wares for the morrow, all these betokened 
a murmuring of life beyond the confines of the 


A FACE IN THE LAMPLIGHT 


9 


narrow street, but mellowed as tlie hum of bees 
in some quiet Old World garden. 

A whiff of salt air drifted from the distant 
wharves to the westward, stinging the nostrils of 
the young man. He was vaguely cognizant of 
the fact that somewhere, up among the attics, a 
girl was singing, sweetly, pensively: 

“In the gloaming, O my darling. 

Think not bitterly of me. . 

Francis wondered whether the words of the 
song meant anything in particular to the singer; 
whether she, early in life, had experienced any¬ 
thing of the bitterness of this brief exile which 
men called living, but which Francis, not having 
ever heard of the great Mystics, Teresa or John 
of the Cross, sometimes felt to be a dying life. 

The words of the old sweet song lay gently on 
his spirit, a little saddened since he had parted 
with his friend at the door of the old church in 
the West End. There were times of late when 
Francis dreaded to be left alone with his 
thoughts. Not even his loved profession, the 
constant reminders of home and an adoring 
mother, his growing professional prestige, his 
youth and splendid young manhood could con¬ 
sole him for the lack of something—what was it? 
—that was missing. 


10 


THE TOWN LANDING 


Slowly the flush died out on the pavements. A 
silver crescent of moon, like a shy maiden, 
peeped adroitly out among a handful of stars. 
Bells began to call to one another from church 
steeples. As Francis listened pensively, a soft 
light crept into his face. He recalled through 
these sweet tones the bells of his native village. 
As a boy he had often heard them calling on still 
evenings, floating over the fallow pasture lands 
and losing themselves in a deep rich silence. 

In spirit his heart leaped to meet the loved 
image recalled by these dulcet notes—his mother. 
For evening is the time when men’s minds turn 
homeward by instinct. At the end of fevered 
hours, when for a time business cares and the 
endless chain of petty distractions are a little 
removed in distance, then, out of the silence and 
the sunset, from the deep throat of a church bell, 
a man’s soul or his good angel speaks to him. 
Then if ever he listens. 

So Francis, standing in the doorway, saw in 
spirit his old home town, its quaint and graceful 
streets overhung by ancient trees, its flelds and 
rustic bridges, its woods and rills, its meadow 
flowers, its dear and familiar faces. Nothing was 
changed in any way, but all were faithful to his 
memory of them and the time when he had 
walked among them, a carefree lad. He was 


A FACE IN THE LAMPLIGHT 


11 


glad to-night that no blot or stain had ever de¬ 
faced their perfect beauty, that this memory at 
least was pure and peaceful. 

Francis looked down the street that was now 
commencing to grow dusky. The bells had 
ceased to call, and the children’s voices were 
silent. Night sounds burst softly on the air. 
Footsteps died away, and street lamps blinked in 
friendly fashion at one another from their re¬ 
spective corners. 

Francis was suddenly arrested by a face in the 
lamplight. It was that of a young girl. She 
passed beneath the doorway where he stood, and 
as she passed, suddenly she raised her eyes and 
met his own fixed steadily on her. She instantly 
withdrew her gaze and passed on. She was gone. 
He had caught but a fleeting glimpse of her face, 
but in that brief instant he had recognized some¬ 
thing. What was it? Perhaps a kindred spirit. 
But he never dreamed that he would see her 
again. 

An hour later Francis threw aside the Satur¬ 
day Evening Post and yawned. He rose, took 
a decisive turn about the room, and finally moved 
over to the piano. His fine tenor took up the re¬ 
frain of his favorite Ave Maria, by Percy Kahn, 
dedicated to one who, a prince among the golden¬ 
voiced of earth, had passed into the Great 


n 


THE TOWN LANDING 


Silence: “Ave Maria—gratia plena—Dominus 
tecum—benedicta tu-” 

With singular, passionate tenderness the fine 
rich notes fell on the silence of the little room. 
Francis called upon her whom he did not know 
as a mother. And then the fortissimo: “Sancta 

Maria—ora pro nobis-” There was almost a 

cry of despair in the petition to the Mother of 
Mercies as the beautiful measures rose and fell. 

The mood passed. Francis rose from the in¬ 
strument and flung himself into the depths of an 
armchair. 

The hours passed. 

‘T wonder,” he said, pensively, as the clock 
struck the hour of midnight, ‘‘what Barrows 
wanted in the church when there was nobody 
there. Strange old chap! Can’t quite make him 
out sometimes.” 





II 


MRS. TOMER’S BOARDING HOUSE 

I T’S a cold world,” said the tall, lank and 
hungry-eyed man at the end of the table, 
helping himself unconsciously to his neigh¬ 
bor’s butter. The tall hungry-eyed man was 
notoriously absent-minded, but no one took 
offense at his idiosyncrasies. 

He drove milk teams and only appeared at the 
common table for the evening meal. He should 
have had his own table and been surrounded by 
a merry, noisy, affectionate group of his own 
children, for he was a lonely and affectionate 
soul. But his day had slipped by, bringing 
middle age. He had been the sole support of a 
widowed mother until her death, and had also 
contributed to the upkeep of a group of small 
nieces and nephews in the disability or disinclina¬ 
tion of their father to do so. The old mother 
was now laid away. The nieces and nephews 
were able to do for themselves, and never so 
much as sent him a card at Christmas or Easter. 
He had a faint suspicion that they were ashamed 

13 


14 


THE TOWN LANDING 


of him, for they had all obtained good positions, 
and moved in “society/’ Just what this society 
comprised the tall hungry-souled uncle never 
pretended to know. But it represented some¬ 
thing too exalted for association with milk cans 
and back stoops, where you sneaked softly up at 
four A.M. and were sometimes rewarded by the 
throwing of an old shoe if you happened to make 
a noise. 

“Yes, ’tis,” responded the tall man’s neighbor 
on the right, jabbing viciously and hopelessly at 
a piece of veiy tough steak. “Yes, ’tis cold! 
Yes, ’tis tough!” He might have meant the steak, 
but he referred to the world. “Nobody’s got 
time to do a kind turn to anyone else. We’re too 
darn busy, that’s it. The world’s going too fast. 
You’ve got to keep up or be left behind.” 

He resigned the steak with woeful counte¬ 
nance, and took a gulp out of a huge mug of tea. 
Table manners were not a strong institution at 
Mrs. Tomer’s boarding house, although kind 
hearts a-plenty assembled around the meager 
board, hopefully expectant of the better things 
which failed to come. 

“Yes, it’s cold, ’n it’s tough, all right,” as¬ 
sented the man on the tall hungry man’s left. 
“Now there’s old lady Smithers that lives down 
in Rutland Square, She’s a good old soul and 


MRS. TOMER’S BOARDING HOUSE 


15 


lives all alone. I guess she’s fixed so’s she can 
just about squeeze a little sugar into her tea, and 
that’s about all. Who cares for her? Why, the 
old lady was waiting for a letter that should have 
come at Christmas or thereabouts. I Imew it 
wouldn’t come, and so I just couldn’t bear to dis¬ 
appoint her.” 

“And you wrote one yourself and sent it, 
didn’t you, Abie?” shrieked the chorus around 
the table. They were rather proud of Abie’s phil¬ 
anthropies and felt that they added a certain dig¬ 
nity to the establishment which even tough steak 
and very weak tea could not dissipate. 

“Well, yes, I wrote her one myself. And be¬ 
lieve me, boys, and begging your pardon, ladies, 
I was more than repaid by the pleasure that it 
gave her. I got a card at the five and ten. If 
only I had money, I’d-” 

Visions of what Abie would do if he had 
money faded suddenly when the door opened 
and a tall slim girl appeared, her face somewhat 
flushed and weary from apparent fatigue, her 
dark curls bewitchingly disordered. 

“It’s Barby,” screamed the chorus. 

There was silence for a moment while the girl, 
Barbara, slipped into her place between little Miss 
Graham, a seamstress, and Mrs. Tomer’s oldest 
girl, a tall freckled-faced child who rarely spoke. 



16 


THE TOWN LANDING 


but listened eagerly to all that went on in this 
charmed circle. Minnie was trying to make up 
her little mind as to whether she would be a lady 
postmistress or owner of a milk depot or a fash¬ 
ionable model such as Miss Graham sometimes 
showed her in the fashion sheets. But she 
thought that she would wait and see what Barby 
chose before coming to a definite decision. Barby 
was everyone’s sunshine' and everyone’s heroine. 

The little circle was strangely silent. A sort 
of depression rested over it. They all loved 
Barby, who was always ready to listen or to sym¬ 
pathize in their little joys and sorrows. She was 
infinitely superior to her surroundings. But 
Barby had been out of work when she came to 
the boarding house two months before, and save 
for occasional jobs of a few days at a time ad¬ 
dressing envelopes at the Mailing Company, she 
had so far been unsuccessful in finding it. It was a 
very bad time to be stranded in a big city. Barby 
had told them that she came from New York 
State. She was an orphan—that was all they 
knew about her history. No one ventured to in¬ 
trude on her secret if she had one. Yes, it was a 
very unpropitious time to be looking for work. 
No wonder that the faithful allies at Mrs. 
Tomer’s looked troubled. 

“I’ve been trying again all day to find some- 


MRS. TOMER^S BOARDING HOUSE 17 


thing,” Barby explained, attacking the hash with 
that hearty appetite which can soon dissipate 
girlish sorrow. “Really, you don’t know how 
many interesting experiences one gets looking 
for work. Nobody has the least interest in you 
under those conditions. And then, too, if you 
happen to know that your shoes are run down at 
the heels and your suit is shiny, it doesn’t in¬ 
crease confidence.” 

After a silence she went on. “The least 
people can do for you, and sometimes the most, 
is to be sorry for you. Well, I tried a Domestic 
Bureau. It was in charge of a frail nervous little 
lady. And oh, what do you think? Her one 
ambition in life is to have someone write a story 
about her. Isn’t it odd? Poor creature! Her 
quaint little shop with the cretonne and the 
canary birds makes you think of an artist’s 
studio. But she’s not an impossible heroine. I’m 
not sure she would not make a wonderful novel. 

“Well, she didn’t have anything. Mrs. Some¬ 
body wanted a maid to tend her pet Pomeranian. 
Fancy! Somebody else wanted a companion for 
travel, but I was just too late for that. Some¬ 
body else had just been there and taken off the 
prize. I’d rather be in a factory than cooped up 
dusting bric-a-brac and wearing a uniform. 
’Tisn’t pride, but I couldn’t stand it-” 



18 


THE TOWN LANDING 


The company about the table straightened, 
and Abie lifted a hopeful countenance from be¬ 
hind a huge basket of gingerbread. Barby was 
wonderful. She still had so much spirit, which 
no misfortune could quite consume. 

Mrs. Tomer bustled in with dessert just then. 
Faces looked hopeful for a moment, then 
dropped as suddenly. It was vanilla corn starch 
again, much lacking in vanilla, and much 
watered. 

But they attacked it vigorously. Barbara 
seemed to make the best of everything. She ate 
with evident relish, for it was good to know that 
she still had sufficient money in her purse to pur¬ 
chase the necessities of life. 

Then, just as the dishes were being carried 
away, the landlady, her face sagging a bit at the 
sides appeared and made her little announce¬ 
ment. 

“It’s really too bad, ladies and gentlemen, and 
I hate to do it. But I shall be obliged to raise 
the board fifty cents per week from this time on. 
It’s the price of spinach and potatoes and the 
common things that does it. I’m awfully sorry.” 

Barbara felt a sort of stab at her heart. 
Everything seemed to go against her. . . . 
They left the table, a rather subdued little group. 
They Imew that Mrs. Tomer could not help it. 


MRS. TOMER’S BOARDING HOUSE 


19 


Who could? Ah, therein lay the mystery. Who 
was to blame for the high cost of living, the mys¬ 
terious ascent in the price of certain things? 
Who was to blame for the extortion in certain 
avenues of buying? They wished to know, for 
these persons were alone responsible for the 
many heartaches, the bitter and weary burden 
and the almost hopelessness of the poor. But 
nobody knew just who was to blame. In this 
strange way Providence gave them a chance to 
practice submission and patience. 

Barbara wearily ascended the two flights of 
stairs which led to her little attic room, and 
closed the door after her with a heavy sigh of re¬ 
lief. She sat down upon the small white iron cot 
and brushed back the rich dark curls that hung in 
profusion over her brow. Her face was not 
beautiful; her features were certainly not 
classical. But there was a sort of sunshine lurk¬ 
ing at the corners of her mouth, a mouth meant 
for laughter, and a suspicion of mischief in the 
large gray eyes whose depths seemed to veil but 
poorly a mind unusually vigorous and under¬ 
standing. 

The room was certainly not artistic, although 
Barbara’s efforts had tried to make it so. She 
looked up. The ceiling was unprepossessing to 
begin with. The kalsomine was beginning to 


20 


THE TOWN LANDING 


chip off in places, and there were several great 
ugly spots where the rain had filtered through. 
In the center was an ugly blotch, with the foun¬ 
dation for electric fixtures never utilized. The 
picture moulding was struggling unevenly, 
striving to part company with the wall paj^er, 
and the latter had received some generous 
splashes of whitewash in the long ago. The floor 
was uneven, painted a dull red by the girl’s clever 
fingers after she had laboriously filled in the 
huge cracks witlji putty. Mrs. Tomer had pro¬ 
vided the paint, but the cost of labor was too 
great to permit of having the poor place newly 
decorated. If Barbara wanted to do it herself 
of an evening. . . . 

Barbara wanted to and did, for she loved 
beauty and hated ugliness. Of course the floor 
was made brighter and more sanitary. But it 
was still far from satisfactory, for in places it 
humped like a camel’s back, and the rough nails 
stood out here and there to challenge the tips of 
your shoes if you were not mindful of them. 

The small white iron bed was good enough in 
its way, and Barbara had no quarrel with it. Nor 
with the neat washstand and plain bureau, which' 
latter she had adorned with a few girlish trifles. 
It boasted a small statue of the Blessed Virgin, 
her most cherished possession, painted white and 


MRS. TOMER’S BOARDING HOUSE 21 


blue, with pure, sweet countenance and hands 
folded. 

Barbara, regarding the loved image to-night, 
bit her lip and struggled to keep back tempta¬ 
tion, knowing that success or failure in the eyes 
of the world were all one with God so long as a 
soul followed faithfully His divine inspira¬ 
tions. 

On the table were a few choice books. The 
girl ran her quick eye over the titles as they 
ranged in neat row: The Life of St. John 
Berchmans, by Father Goldie, S. J., The New 
Testament, The Psalms, Abandonment to Divine 
Providence, by Father Caussade, and a few 
others. 

Feeling the need of some comforting word, 
she took up Abandonment, and, opening at 
chance, read hungrily: 

‘‘The garden of souls resembles no other, for 
among the flowers there are no two alike, except 
in the fldelity with which they respond to the 
action of the Creator in leaving Him free to do 
as He pleases. Let God act, and let us do what 
He requires of us. , . 

Barbara closed the book. She felt strangely 
soothed and happier. What a blessed thing it 
was that, when you were far removed from the 
consoling voice of a loved friend and guide, when 


22 


THE TOWN LANDING 


things looked dark and in the distance little rum¬ 
bles of thunder reverberated over your soul, and 
the sun seemed to sink into the horizon where 
lurked the storm, you might at almost any mo¬ 
ment summon up some quiet echoes of a voice 
speaking in the still depths of your heart. . . . 

And now the voice of a holy monk, dead for 
centuries, spoke to the weary and storm-tossed 
soul of Barbara in her poor little attic, as it had 
often spoken amid the vicarious happenings of 
everyday life in the midst of the world. In the 
long years of preparation in religious life this 
holy man had learned through inexpressible 
weariness and pains of soul and body what all 
elect souls must suffer, that only in perfect con¬ 
formity to the Divine Will or in Holy Abandon¬ 
ment can peace be found. Barbara was sin¬ 
gularly interested in the letters of this holy man 
appended to the little book, most of them written 
to nuns. She had been somewhat surprised to 
learn that these elect souls sometimes, as St. 
Teresa, suffered interior trials most grievous— 
even in such happy abodes. It was, then, true 
that the Divine Spouse willed sacrifice and that 
He loved it beyond all price. 

“It’s all right, dear Lord,” whispered the girl 
as she lifted a shining face to the little crucifix 
above her bed. “I leave all to you. I’m through 



MRS. TOMER’S BOARDING HOUSE 23 


fussing and disappointing you. It’s got to come 
right, somehow.” 

Barbara thought that the crown of thorns ap¬ 
peared to rest very lightly on the beautiful brow 
of Christ. She loved Him with all the ardor of 
an affectionate and innocent nature. If in the 
interior life there were dark desolations, was it 
not all worth a moment of union like that whieh 
she experienced now? 

Barbara was a natural girl. She hoped some 
day, like most other girls, that her prinee would 
come and snatch her off on a fiery charger to a 
lovely castle where she would live “forever and 
ever happy after,” as the story books said. 
Barbara relied on the sometime advent of 
the prinee, and even told her Best Friend 
about her desires in the matter of hair, 
eyes and sundry other attributes. Of Flis 
heartfelt interest she felt sure, for had He not on 
earth gone about the common ways of men? He 
had not isolated Himself in the sacred preeincts 
of the Temple, but He had walked about with 
His friends, entering their homes; He had fol¬ 
lowed a funeral train and sat at a marriage feast. 
So Barbara knew that His human heart was 
throbbing with tense interest for all her little 
fancies, and that nothing was too small to pour 
into the abyss of His Divine Heart. 


24 


THE TOWN LANDING 


Barbara took off her shoes slowly to-night. 
She found a quiet humor, in her present frame of 
mind, in the fact that they were in so dilapidated 
a state. She dared not venture on another pair 
until she felt certain of obtaining work. In the 
morning she meant to scan the advertising col¬ 
umns of the papers again. 

Drip, drip on the roof just over her head, the 
raindrops began to fall. To others they might 
have a dreary sound. To Barbara they were 
friendly. The rain bespoke the munificence of 
God, who sent it to refresh the torrid earth. It 
gently nourished with its grateful moisture 
thousands of little seeds covered over in the soft 
bosom of the soil. It was sipped up eagerly by 
the roots of the trees just beginning to sprout 
into tiny green shoots. The sound of the rain 
was very friendly to-night. 

Drip, drip on the eaves it fell. Barbara, lying 
awake for a few moments thought in particular 
of a young man who had brushed hastily past her 
in the hall of the building where she had gone to 
visit the Domestic Bureau. He had turned to 
apologize for his act. She recalled the soft rich 
tones of his voice, almost like music—she had 
hardly seen his face- 

She recalled that he had carried a small black 
leather bag in his hand, and that he had jumped 



MRS. TOMER’S BOARDING HOUSE 25 


into a car waiting outside the door, and driven 
away. 

Then she fell asleep and dreamed that this 
stranger with the soft voice and the bag had 
suddenly changed into the Prince, and that he 
had eome to carry her away to a fairy castle 
called Abandonment. 


THE FIRST DAY OF MAY 


T he first day of May. In the parks and 
gardens the buds were bursting eagerly 
and the sap ran joyously in the trunks of 
the trees and shrubs. A faint, far fragrance 
seemed to linger in these erstwhile dusty and 
commercial streets as if to suggest something 
more lovely than commerce and unceasing strife. 

Barbara was an optimist by nature. She 
could not remain downcast for long. So she 
broke into a swifter pace as she turned the corner 
of Washington Street and came up School 
Street past all manner of delightful and quaint 
shops. Life seemed very bright to-day. She 
had hung for a few moments about the vicinity 
of Summer Street where Ralph Waldo Emerson 
had lived as a boy. She had just finished reading 
the Essay on Friendship, and pictured to her¬ 
self with infinite delight the old family mansion 
with the garden and the fence and other familiar 
landmarks of the boyhood of a great literary 
light. Now a huge clothing establishment 


THE FIRST DAY OF MAY 


27 


flaunted its models in glass cases, and cried out 
to her of the swift passing of the years. She 
heaved a sigh, realizing that the world was 
strangely altered since those far-back days. Was 
it—had it been for the better? In all this tre¬ 
mendous incessant hum of business, was there 
more peace and content? 

Before the windows of the Old Corner Book¬ 
store Barbara paused to feast her hungry eyes 
on the treasures there revealed: books of travel 
in foreign lands, their opened covers showing de¬ 
licious photogravures of ancient cities, historic 
bridges, ruins; biographies of men and Avomen of 
whom she had often yearned to know more. 
Kindly genuine faces looking out at you from 
a maze of printed matter, exquisite editions of 
the old authors, the best-known and loved, the 
wisest and most human, ahvays new, never old. 

Barbara caught her breath in ecstasy as her 
eye wandered to a corner where hung several 
rare old colored prints from Nicholas Nickleby 
and David Copperfield. David setting off in 
search of his Aunt Betsy Trotwood, a little pa¬ 
thetic figure with mop of tumbled golden hair, 
having sold his waistcoat in order to defray the 
expenses of the journey. David with Dora, his 
child wife. “When you are going to be angry 
with me say to yourself: ‘It’s only my child 


28 


THE TOWN LANDING 


wife.’ ” David and Agnes, kindred spirits in the 
quaint little house. They unfolded rare delights 
to the heart of the girl who stood before 
them. 

She passed on to Tremont Street. The tower 
of the Park Street Church was just pointing to 
twelve o’clock. Barbara was hungry. But it 
was a long time until the supper hour and she re¬ 
solved to prolong the luncheon hour in order to 
thoroughly appease the pangs which rehl hunger 
brings in its wake. 

She passed slowly by the Old Granary Bury¬ 
ing Grounds, and paused to look through the iron 
fence at the leaning gray stones that marked the 
spot where the early settlers of the town were 
laid to rest. Up and down unthinking crowds 
hurried past them, nor even paused to bestow a 
thought or a prayer on the dead. It was not a 
Catholic cemetery, for the cross was nowhere to 
be seen, emblem of peace and hope to the dead 
and the living. The very human heart of the girl 
yearned toward these unknown sleepers, whose 
memory was withered like grass and who had dis¬ 
appeared as a cloud in the ether. While she and 
others walked up and down the streets, some¬ 
times dejected, sometimes inexpressibly weary, 
but always hopeful, these dead were free from 
earthly obligations. 


THE FIRST DAY OF MAY 


29 


Barbara thought of Evangeline’s grave beside 
that of Gabriel in the little cemetery of Grand- 
Pre, and the beautiful strains of the poet’s 
lamentation: 

In the heart of the city they lie, unknown and unnoticed. 
Daily the tides of life go ebbing and flowing beside them; 
Thousands of throbbing hearts where theirs are at rest and 
forever. 

Thousands of aching brains where theirs no longer are 
busy. 

Thousands of toiling hands where theirs have ceased from 
their labors. 

Thousands of weary feet where theirs have completed their 
journey. 

Barbara purchased a paper at a newsstand, 
looking hungrily at the flowers exposed in dainty 
baskets for sale—May flowers, delicate pink 
with glossy brown leaves. A little pain rose in 
her soul when she remembered that she dared not 
buy them. She walked through the Common, 
where the grass was just turning green and 
tender. Swarms of chattering pigeons trailed 
greedily after her, hoping for a share of peanuts, 
but vainly. After following her for a few yards, 
they turned in search of more promising ma¬ 
terial. 

The ancient elms were slowly opening their 
first blooms to the warm golden sunlight. They 


30 


THE TOWN LANDING 


were somewhat retarded in their development 
by the coldness of the spring season. Barbara 
tried to picture the house in which Longfellow 
had lived on Beacon street, facing the bright 
green expanse ^^Lfirf and the frog pond, and 
where so many beautiful thoughts had come to 
him which he afterward wrote down for the 
world to read. 

She crossed Charles Street and entered the 
Public Garden. Already the swan boats were 
basking in the sunshine, drying lazily after a 
bath of fresh white and green paint. 

At the edge of the miniature pond flowing be¬ 
neath two arched stone bridges and overhung by 
weeping willows, just opposite a tiny island of 
rocks and moss-covered shrubs, where number¬ 
less sparrows were spring house-cleaning Bar¬ 
bara sat down on a bench and unfolded the news¬ 
paper. She looked about her first, however, and 
noticed the figures sitting on the adjoining 
benches, tried to fancy which of them were out 
of work and suffering. It was not difficult to 
guess which. Poverty, privation, pain, mental 
or physical, brought the same weary stoop to the 
shoulders, the same dejection to the eyes, the 
same inexpressible something which was hardly 
analogous to prosperity. 

“IVe just got to do something for a while,” 


THE FIRST DAY OF MAY 


31 


she whispered to herself. “IVe got to find some¬ 
thing ; that’s all there is to it. Maybe I could be 
a governess or something like that-” 

She read through the “Wanted” columns 
slowly. Then she brightened jpere^tibly. 

“Wanted, girls to work On artificial flowers* 
Apply room number-Summer Street.” 

Perhaps she would be successful in persuading 
those in charge of the flower shop that she was 
competent. She hoped so. 

The streets were crowded now, with noon 
pedestrians passing to and fro, lunching, shop¬ 
ping, gazing into the shop windows, promenad¬ 
ing. The girl shrank from them. She could not 
bear the sight of the gaudy windows with their 
expensive nothings. 

She hid the bit of paper containing the address 
of the flower shop in her worn glove. Time and 
again in happier days had she glanced carelessly 
at the classified advertisements with their “Help 
Wanted,” with something of a superior emotion. 
Situations wanted, help wanted—such subjects 
had never troubled her tranquil thoughts. She 
had never dreamed of a day to come when, weary 
and dispirited, she must climb flight after flight 
of musty stairs which creaked beneath her 
slender weight, peering eagerly through dingy 
transoms to encounter the rude gaze of those of 





32 


THE TOWN LANDING 


her own sex who, secure in their paltry positions, 
had scant sympathy for one whose apparent deli¬ 
cacy and refinement made her superior to them. 
Alas for the weakness of human nature! Bar¬ 
bara, in a few short, sad months, had learned to 
expect no mercy. 

So now she betook herself to the address indi¬ 
cated on the bit of paper, stopping to refresh her¬ 
self at a cafeteria with a glass of milk and a sand¬ 
wich. It was becoming second nature now to 
scan the menus with eager gaze in order to search 
out the least expensive dishes; to see whether or 
not one might dare invest in a salad or whether 
one must compromise on a slim sandwich. It 
was but a single stone on the rough path whither 
the slender feet were wearily traveling. 

Barbara fancied that the waitress looked at¬ 
tentively at her. She was uncomfortably con¬ 
scious that this unknown girl of plainly inferior 
birth and breeding, coarse-featured, and with 
rudeness of accent, knew just how much small 
change lay in the depths of her worn leather 
purse. Then a saving sense of humor came to 
the rescue. She remembered something that a 
certain wise old monk had said in his age-old 
monastery, and she smiled bravely. After all, 
her sorrows were but a small part of the great 
universal weary burden which most of the world 


THE FIRST DAY OF MAY 


33 


had to carry day after day. She thought that 
perhaps some day her little miseries would make 
this old world, so tired and so unkind, somewhat 
merrier and more patient with its children. 

She smiled, therefore, and looked cheerily into 
the face of the waitress. And strange—or was it 
strange?—the girl seemed to light up suddenly. 
Certain crude lines in her face smoothed out as 
if they had been ironed. Barbara wondered 
about the girl, whether she too had secret 
miseries. She could not loiow that the girl was 
the mother of two minor children and that her 
husband had deserted her; that she had placed 
the little ones in the Day Nursery that very 
morning ere she hastened to her post, where she 
shuffled to and fro carrying huge piles of dishes 
to patrons who rarely failed to reproach her with 
her lack of speed, her clumsiness and with various 
other things. Either the buckwheat cakes were 
underdone or they were overdone, or someone 
had plainly ordered coffee who had plainly 
ordered something else. Or a trying patron, 
feminine, had changed her mind—according to 
the privilege of her sex and had now decided on 
tea. These and other things too trivial to men¬ 
tion went to make up an inglorious and un¬ 
profitable day. 

‘‘.What did ‘Abandonment’ say?” mused Bar^ 




34 


THE TOWN LANDING 


bara. '‘Something about God’s disposition of 
our affairs. I suppose that He sees all that hap¬ 
pens to us, and knows how miserable life can be 
at times. One moment the sun is shining, and 
the next it’s pouring. Funny old world! But 
after all it’s very beautiful somehow!” 

Through the old and tortuous streets of the 
city that held such historic charm in spite of its 
unpleasant features, the crowds jostled one an¬ 
other. Now and again the girl saw through 
plate-glass windows the absorbed faces of clerks 
poring over huge ledgers, and evidently musty 
like their books. But what a blessing work be¬ 
came when one was in search of it and suffering! 

Number-was an old worm-eaten building 

with a steep flight of stairs just within the en¬ 
trance leading to the magical world of artificial 
flowers. Never had real flowers in all their fra¬ 
grant beauty so appealed to the heart of the girl 
as these imaginary flowers which she had not 
even seen as yet. With hopes rapidly rising, 
Barbara climbed up, up. There were several 
landings and diverse dirty doorways. In the 
dim light, she could barely discern the inscrip¬ 
tions on them. At the end of one which re^ 
sembled an art studio a figure in a jaded velvet 
cap very much on one side appraised her and 
cleared its throat once or twice. She did not 



THE FIRST DAY OF MAY 


35 


\ 

pause, but went up, up, half fearful that the 
horrid ogre in the doorway would follow her. It 
did not. 

On the third floor Barbara found the shop 
where they wanted girls to work on artificial 
flowers. The door was closed. She knocked 
timidly. Receiving no response, she pushed it 
open and entered. When one is out of work and 
dependent on the world, one always proceeds 
timidly. Perhaps this very position, apologetic, 
assailable, helps to ensure positive defeat. For 
the world likes a bold front. Barbara dimly 
recognized the sad truth of it. 

A row of girls in gaudy costumes were seated 
at long benches in the center of the room. 
Heaps of flowers dyed in outrageous hues 
toppled over everything. They littered the 
benches and chairs, the floor and windowsills. 
They were horribly unattractive and artificial. 

Barbara’s hopes sank swiftly. It is a relent¬ 
less transition from hope to despair. Body and 
soul grow sick and faint on such occasions. 
Happiness, success, seem such far-off elusive 
things! You have followed them for a long, 
long way. At every moment you hope to catch 
up with them. Now you have almost gained the 
shadow; now your hand is nearly upon the filmy 
garments, when, alas, they have vanished swiftly 


4 


36 THE TOWN LANDING 

around a corner, and you stand defeated, 
dazed. 

Barbara tremblingly stated her request to a 
huge giant with deep scowls between his brows. 
She thought that the man was even more un¬ 
wholesome, more untidy than the surround¬ 
ings. 

The girls at work looked up, stopped chewing 
gum for an instant to regard her unfavorably. 
The girl nearest Barbara tossed her head scorn¬ 
fully and indicated to her companion that on no 
account would she approve of the newcomer. 

“No, you wouldn’t do,” replied the giant with 
the knitted brows. “You ain’t strong enough. 
And anyway, you ain’t the kind.” 

Barbara escaped from the oppressive atmos¬ 
phere and breathed a sigh of relief. Far better 
slow starvation than this. Then she laughed at 
her own mood. And yet our hopes, our consola¬ 
tions are apt to be considerably diminished when 
the last door of our resources is suddenly closed^ 
leaving us on the other side. 

Barbara, passing suddenly out into the warm 
sunlight, straightened her hat, which had nearly 
fallen off in her hasty exit from the unfriendly 
spot. She was disappointed, yes, but not hope¬ 
less, for she had youth and trust on her side, and 
the sacred human heart of One who had promised 


THE FIRST DAY OF MAY 


37 


that He would never break the bruised reed nor 
quench the smoking flax. 

Back there a few nights ago, in the solitude of 
old St. Joseph’s, Barbara had felt how good it 
was to throw her whole weight on Christ. There, 
with the red lamp casting its radiance on His 
wounds, His side had gleamed like a red, red 
rose, like a whole garden of roses. Roses of pain, 
love, joy, hope, with the beautiful scent of blos¬ 
soms just before they die. 

She wished someone was at hand to whom she 
could speak. Just the sound of a friendly voice, 
just the clasp of a warm hand or the flashing re¬ 
sponse of a kindly eye would have meant so 
much! How she longed to cast herself bodily 
into the arms of a friend—no friend in particular 
—just someone good and kind and true. Would 
that even a dumb creature were at hand to re¬ 
spond to her mood! She was terribly alone, 
after all. There are such moments in all 
lives. 

Barbara recrossed Tremont Street, where the 
busy crowds were eternally passing to and fro. 
She walked past the Old Granary Burying 
Grounds and looked in absently. It was very 
quiet in there where the grass was velvet to the 
kiss of the sun and where the tottering tomb¬ 
stones eyed her in friendly fashion. Wisely they 



38 


THE TOWN LANDING 


seemed to peer into her face as if to command 
her attention and to speak to her. 

A responsive light crept into her eyes. There 
was something very appealing, very soothing in 
the quiet of the spot. There, within the shadow 
of a modern skyscraper and the old brick church, 
the dead bivouacked. Of a generation long past, 
they kept faith with the present, resenting not at 
all the fact that a modern city had grown up 
about them, yet refraining from encroaching on 
their peaceful home, here where the green lace- 
work of tall old elms wove embroidered patterns 
with the sunlight. 

Barbara did not wonder that in the painful 
struggles which some souls had to endure there 
were those who envied the sleepers. 


IV 


A FUNNY OLD WORLD 


D octor SOMERS recalled many times 
the little incident of his friend’s visit to 
old St. Joseph’s in the West End, now 
several weeks past. He sometimes wondered 
about George Barrows. There seemed to be 
depths in his character never quite revealed to 
those nearest to him. True, all lives were lived 
more or less in private. But, granting that 
there were barriers in every human life beyond 
which none may penetrate, they seemed more im¬ 
pregnable, more baffling when they surrounded 
this young man. 

Francis knew that George was an ardent 
Catholic, and wondered at it. He knew a little of 
the externals of the Church and of his friend’s de¬ 
votion—that, for instance, George invariably at¬ 
tended the Nightworkers’ Mass at half-past 
three on Sunday mornings. Well nigh ex¬ 
hausted when he finally closed the editorial desk, 
Francis could picture him taking his way 
through the deserted streets to old St. James, 

39 


40 


THE TOWN LANDING 


down in the heart of Chinatown. ’Twas strange! 
And Francis had a vague idea that George went 
to Mass daily, and perhaps to Holy Commun¬ 
ion. He knew the customs of pious Catholics, 
although he could not appreciate them. 

Francis admired George. There seemed to 
be but one weak point about him, his religion. 
For to Francis the Catholic Church represented 
a distinctly foreign element, an undesirable ele¬ 
ment of age-old superstition. Beyond a feeling 
of pity for her blindness he had no quarrel with 
the Church. And yet his friend’s loyalty an- 
teoyed him strangely. 

Passing through the old North End, one eve- 
hing and along Hanover Street, he saw just 
ahead a church tower. He did not know that it 
was old St. Stephen’s. Once a flourishing Irish 
parish, it had now but a handful of the early 
families among its congregation. And yet it 
somehow kept a charm, as historic places always 
do, especially if they be connected with religion. 

A strong scent of the salt water stung his nos¬ 
trils. Just beyond, although he could not see, 
was the water. The old congested district ap¬ 
pealed to Francis, who liked nothing so well as 
to feel the pulse of life throbbing all about him. 

Voices in the soft and beautiful Neapolitan 
tongue reached his ear, and a soft light came 


A FUNNY OLD WORLD 


41 


over his countenance. Francis was particularly 
fond of the Italian language, which suggested 
images of beauty to his sensitive soul. 

Glancing down a short side street, he suddenly 
saw a cross gleaming over an open doorway. He 
stopped short. Why, he never could tell. But 
he stood irresolute for a moment, looking in the 
direction of the cross. 

There was something strangely fascinating 
about the cross. Among the thousands of roof¬ 
tops, steeples, domes, treetops, weathervanes, 
emblems of all sorts, it stood out clearly. It 
was a relic of history made nearly two thousand 
years ago on the summit of a Hill in far-off 
Palestine. It was far more solitary, far more 
august, far more significant than Bunker Hill 
Monument or the Minute Man or any of the his¬ 
toric monuments which stood proudly out over 
the landscape and challenged the attention of 
all who looked upon them and recalled the stir¬ 
ring memories which they bespoke. 

The cross was the emblem of pain, strange 
relic of a pagan world when men put their vic¬ 
tims to death on its extended arms. Long ages 
had taught more civilized and humane methods 
of punishment. And now, in the filtering sun¬ 
beams of this back city street, above the vege¬ 
tables exposed in the vendors’ carts, above the 


42 


THE TOWN LANDING 


array of washings floating from sundry balconies 
and fire escapes, the cross still threw out its ro¬ 
bust and friendly arms. 

It fascinated Francis the while he disliked it. 
He hesitated a moment, then turned abruptly 
into the narrow street and walked to the open 
door of the church. 

Within its shadow a group of noisy children 
were playing and quarreling healthily. Their 
shouts penetrated into the peace of the holy 
place. A very old woman came out of the 
church; in her hands was a string of brown 
wooden beads. 

Feeling that every fiber of his being vibrated 
with a horrid repugnance to his act, Francis reso¬ 
lutely pushed his way into the dim interior. A 
long flight of cement stairs led down, down into 
seemingly utter blackness. Once he nearly 
stumbled, but clutched at the railing and finally 
found himself on the ground. 

It was quite dark for awhile, but gradually 
his eyes became accustomed to the dim light. He 
walked up the center aisle, wondering at himself. 

There were several dark-curtained closets on 
either side of the church. These Francis judged 
rightly to be confessionals. He shuddered again. 
Memories of dreadful things he had heard or 
read came back to him. The confessionals 


A FUNNY OLD WORLD 


43 


seemed like monsters hiding grim secrets in their 
embrace. “I suppose it’s just a part of the 
money-making scheme,” he said to himself and 
passed them by. 

In one of the pews he observed a blackshawled 
figure rocking itself to and fro—whether in mis¬ 
ery or in ecstasy he could not tell. But he caught 
the words in Latin, “Sancta Maria . . . Mater 
Dei.” 

There came to him unbidden the strains of the 
beautiful refrain by Percy Kahn, his favorite. 
This poor woman understood more than he of 
the meaning of these words! ’Twas strange! 

Francis slipped mechanically into a pew near 
the altar and sat down on the bench. He waited 
to see what would happen next. 

But nothing happened. After awhile several 
bareheaded children trooped in and up to the 
altar, where, after much bobbing up and down 
and blessing themselves and scampering to and 
fro among the various shrines and falling over 
one another, they finally ended in a burst of 
giggling and disappeared noisily. 

Francis smiled somewhat ironically. It 
seemed grotesquely irreverent to him. He could 
not understand that the children were simply ex¬ 
pressing themselves, that they were at home in 
their Father’s house. Possibly children born of 



44 


THE TOWN LANDING 


American parents did not behave in just this 
fashion. Or possibly they did at times, for chil¬ 
dren will not be old men and women. It was 
simply their manner. They were born for 
laughter and sunshine; they were carrying their 
little joys to the feet of the loving Saviour. 
Surely He understood better than this proud 
young man that they came in response to His 
invitation of the long ago. Christ may even have 
been singularly comforted to see them scamper 
up to Him just to say “Buon giorno, Signore 
mio!” and then run hastily away to their play. 
.Who could tell? 

Several other worshipers, all feminine, trudged 
in and out while Francis sat silent near the altar. 
They were all singularly demonstrative in their 
devotions, sometimes praying audibly, sometimes 
prostrating themselves, and striking their breasts. 
He was rather amused by it all. 

“And this is the Catholic Church!” he mused. 

To the left of the main altar was a shrine with 
vivid representation of the Suffering Souls ap¬ 
pealing to the Madonna for aid. From a very 
realistic furnace of flames the tortured ones lifted 
their hands to the Lady who, with a very chubby 
child in her arms, looked toward them but made 
no sign. Francis sighed. He did not sympa¬ 
thize. 


A FUNNY OLD WORLD 


45 


Over the main altar, in a niche, he suddenly 
noticed a radiant figure which had not come to 
his attention until now. He straightened him¬ 
self and gazed attentively at this figure. It 
touched a responsive chord in his soul. 

It was the figure of a young monk, strongly 
built, in brown habit, his waist girded by a white 
cord. He knelt in adoration before a lovely Child 
in white tunic Who stood on a prie-dieu but a 
few feet away. 

With head thrown back and gleaming eyes 
fastened on the radiant apparition, the monk 
contemplated the child in apparent ecstasy of 
soul. His strong arms outstretched, the sleeve 
of his habit falling carelessly back a few inches 
from the wrist, showed to advantage a hand fine 
and shapely. Long slender blue-veined fingers 
—pure hands, the hands of a scholar and a saint. 
Was this a mere thing of plaster and paint—or 
was it something else? 

Fascinated by the image, Francis watched the 
ecstatic face in perfect absorption. He would 
not have been surprised if the sensitive lips had 
moved and words come forth, a cry of love or 
pain. The countenance, shining with seraphic 
light, the forehead surmounted by a circlet of 
light-brown hair, the rest of the head shorn 
smooth. 


46 


THE TOWN LANDING 


Such purity, such intensity of feeling, such 
yearning, such exquisite love and peace awoke 
an untouched note in the melody of the young 
physician’s soul. Something like a sob rose in 
his throat. And yet he knew that this was but 
a thing inanimate, a work of art inspired by a 
master hand. His inspiration was but a passing 
dream. So pagan statues in the art galleries 
were beautiful. And yet this was a different 
beauty somehow. 

The face of the youthful monk was ashen gray 
beneath the radiant light that fell from the 
glance of the Child. Probably long vigils and 
severe penances had drawn a veil over those 
lovely features. There came to Francis’ mem¬ 
ory a certain passage of Swinburne: 

*^Thou hast conquered, 0 pale Galilean; the world has 
grown gray with thy breath. 

We have drunken of things Lethean, and fed on the fulL 
ness of death. 

Sleep—shall we sleep after all? For the world is not 
sweet in the end; 

For the old faiths loosen and fall, the new years ruin and 
rend.** 

There was more, but he drove the words from 
his perplexed brain. 

How long Francis remained immovable in 
contemplation of this image of a young Francis- 


A FUNNY OLD WORLD 


47 


can monk of the long ago, he never knew. But 
when finally he woke from his reverie the hidden 
sun was making a dim last glory on the western 
nave of the church and the altar lamp threw 
wider circles out over the sanctuary and quiet 
aisles. 

Turning to leave the altar, Francis noticed an¬ 
other shrine to the right. It represented the 
figure of an aged monk, shriveled and worn, 
clothed in the same brown habit and the same 
white cord. He wore a short pointed beard, and 
his hair was iron gray, so far as he had hair, for 
his head was shaven closer than that of the young 
monk. His body was composed on a marble 
slab, it was long and rigid, the limbs placed 
lightly together, the hands folded on the breast. 
Francis particularly noticed the hands, like those 
of a living corpse, thin, bony, shriveled hands, 
but with the same awful whiteness of purity 
about them. The feet were covered with coarse 
hempen sandals. They were thin and rested 
close together in a straight line. 

Spellbound, for the second time, Francis 
paused and looked intently down at this almost 
living impassive thing. So this was the repre¬ 
sentation of an old monk as he had passed from 
life. . . . An inscription beneath the marble slab 
read: '‘San Leonardo di Porto Maurizio.” 


48 


THE TOWN LANDING 


Again a few lines of Swinburne struggled to 
Francis’s lips; 

lips that the live blood faints in, the leavings of racJcs 
and rods, 

O ghastly glories of saints, dead limbs of gibbeted 
gods. , 

The rack and the rod and the gibbet of this 
man, Francis felt, during his mortal life had been 
the terrible and crucifying immolation of the 
will, of the bleeding heart that must have cried 
out sometimes for the things of men, and yet 
strove to be content with the things of God. For 
the sacrifice of will was the hardest immolation 
of all. 

This dead monk had paid the price of the 
peace he was now enjoying. Worn and 
emaciated in body, but vigorous in soul, his wick 
had burned down steadily into the oil. 

Francis breathed a sigh of relief when be 
finally gained the outer world and stood upon 
the sidewalk. It seemed that the Catholic 
Church had a dangerous charm for the unwary 
who sought to penetrate her thrilling soul mys¬ 
teries. It were best not to be too rash. For she 
threw about the untutored a veil of medieval 
mysticism, so Francis believed, hiding the stern 
practical realities. She intoxicated with her 


A FUNNY OLD WORLD 


49 


beauty, glimpsed here and there in spite of one’s 
unwillingness to respond. 

Francis resolved to attack his friend, George 
Barrows, on the subject of plaster images which 
so disturbed people at times as had those back 
there in the dim old church. 


V 


WHY CAN’T WE BE HAPPY? 

I N the fashionable dressmaking shop of 
Madame Laurier a busy hum of feminine 
voices was plainly discernible above the 
click, click of scissors and the monotonous dron¬ 
ing of a sewing machine. 

It was a small stuffy shop, whose one window 
looked out on the back entrances of a group of 
stone apartments on the next street. INIost of 
these fashionable blocks were lodging houses for 
college students. The latter were accustomed to 
come and sit by the open windows and thrum the 
mandolin or guitar and sometimes nod or smile 
in schoolbo}^ fashion to the girls across the way in 
Madame Laurier’s little shop. The long and 
tedious hours which the apprentices spent bend¬ 
ing over the eternal stitches were somewhat light¬ 
ened by these pleasant little interruptions which 
came floating across the strings of musical instru¬ 
ments. 

There were but three apprentices at work now, 

50 


WHY CAN’T WE BE HAPPY? 


51 


for it was the early part of the summer season— 
Florence Jordan, the head girl, Marie St. Clair, 
and Barbara West, a newcomer whose appren¬ 
ticeship had commenced a week before. 

Barbara, seated beside an open window, was 
industriously hemming a piece of pale blue satin, 
weaving little girlish fancies into every delicate 
stitch. Her fingers, slender and graceful, 
moved swiftly over her work; they seemed made 
to touch delicate and beautiful things. 

A pungent odor of oranges caused the girls to 
pause in their labors and moisten thirsty lips. 
iMadame, in her office, was evidently indulging 
in the luxury of a mid afternoon luncheon. 

Barbara dropped her busy work for a fe^v 
moments. Her eyes strayed beyond the dizzy 
expanse of rooftops to where the white walls of one 
of the playhouses were sunning themselves idly. 
She sighed heavily. Just to sit in the top balcony 
and listen to the sweet strains of music would 
mean inspiration, happiness. But this luxury 
was denied her. 

She looked pensively out into the sky, a little 
tent of blue pitched over the stuffy workroom 
where she sat at her unloved task. 

Little Marie, whose principal duty just now 
was to do errands and to keep the workroom in 
order, was humming a snatch of a song: 


52 


THE TOWN LANDING 


Myrtle and jessamine for you, 

{Oh, the red rose is fair to see!) 

For me the cypress and the rue. 

Marie was almost too young to loiow anything 
but hope, and yet the good things of life had 
early passed her by. 

Her fresh birdlike voice soothed Barbara’s 
ruffled spirits. Florence, calm and quiet, moved 
about the table, adding a pin or a twist to a fold 
of the garment she was draping over a form. 

Yes, life had a touch of brightness even in the 
dull workroom if one did not go purposely seek¬ 
ing out the cobwebs in the corners. Diagonally 
across from the rear of the building was a con¬ 
vent academy. It was a day school where many 
favored children of well-to-do parents enjoyed 
the superior advantages of a training with the 
Sisters. 

Although it was the vacation season, a few of 
the younger children had remained. They were 
enjoying the pleasures of the garden and ran to 
and fro like irresponsible butterflies, their white 
dresses making a pretty picture in contrast to 
the gaily colored flowers. 

Barbara watched them with interest. Their 
future seemed so secure; they knew the peace of 
a good Christian home and loving parents, per¬ 
chance of devoted brothers and sisters. The lot 


WHY CAN’T WE BE HAPPY? 


53 


of the orphan in comparison was bitter unless 
sweetened by a deeper and stronger Love. 

“Don’t you wish you were one of those chil¬ 
dren, Barby?” asked Marie, pausing in her work 
of picking up pins to look wistfully out of the 
window. “To think of having nothing to do but 
enjoy yourself! And to wear pretty dresses 
every day 1” Marie glanced disapprovingly 
at her worn apron and made a wry face which 
caused Florence and Barbara to laugh heartily. 

They did not reply, but in their hearts the two 
older girls could not blame little Marie for her 
dissatisfaction. Life seemed to be unevenly di¬ 
vided somehow. 

“Barbara!” 

The girl rose quickly and moved across the 
hall to the showroom, where her mistress was ex¬ 
hibiting a new gown to a customer. 

Barbara, as model, tried on this gown and 
that, walked up and down the velvet-carpeted 
room, assuming first one pose and then another 
so that the gowns might be viewed from all 
angles. 

Pauline Metz, Madame’s customer, was diffi¬ 
cult to please. She was a young girl and heiress 
to a considerable fortune. A spoiled child, al¬ 
though lovable. 

Pauline glanced curiously at the model. Bar- 


54 


THE TOWN LANDING 


bara. She thought her singularly refined, singu¬ 
larly graceful and very pretty. Clearly she was 
fitted for something better than this. 

When Madame Laurier left the room to an¬ 
swer the telephone, Pauline addressed Barbara 
in a low tone. 

“Tell me—do you like this sort of thing? For 
it must be fearfully stupid. And people are so 
fickle and hard to please. I know that I am. But 
then, I’m tired of everything, and it’s hard to 
suit me. One doesn’t wish to be common, but 
it takes hours of planning and selecting and fit¬ 
ting—and then the gown is a perfect fright! Or 
somebody else has one just like it. Sometimes I 
get dreadfully tired of it all.” 

Pauline was thinking of Dr. Francis Somers 
as she spoke. She liked him, but he seemed to be 
a very unsatisfactory person. Pie appeared in 
society but rarely, and then she was quite certain 
that he knew nothing whatever about ladies’ cos¬ 
tumes, and cared nothing whatever about them. 
Pauline’s mother favored the young and grow¬ 
ing physician, but tlie girl was not anxious to 
please him. Prince Charming should not be ab¬ 
sorbed in horrid germs and stupid bottles and 
books which fairly took one’s breath away with 
their words of prodigious length and impossible 
meaning. 



WRY CAN’T WE BE HAPPY? 


55 


Barbara lifted amused eyes to the lovely face 
before her. 

“I can’t say that I do like this sort of thing^’ 
she confessed frankly. “I’d ever so much rather 
do something else. Almost anything else. But 
we can’t have things our own way always.” 

“That’s just it! Why can’t we?” Pauline 
queried, a discontented little air stealing over her 
fair countenance. “What’s the use of having all 
the money you want, for instance, when things 
aren’t a bit interesting and you’ve got a fright of 
a headache, and when you’ve tried all sorts of 
stunts with your hair and it simply won’t curl? 
And vou see the children in the slum districts 
with the loveliest curls, all natural. Life’s 
awfully stupid at times. Don’t you think so?” 

Madame Laurier hurried into the room just 
then. 

“I’m so sorry. Mademoiselle!” she said. “But 
I can’t possibly have your costume for Wednes¬ 
day night. I’ve just had a call from another cus¬ 
tomer whom I promised ...” 

Pauline smiled ironically at Barbara. “Al¬ 
ways disappointed,” she said. “It seems as if 
things were possessed to be stupid.” 

Barbara slipped away to the workroom. She 
ifound it good to take her place at the open win¬ 
dow and to resume her work. She had food for 


56 


THE TOWN LANDING 


thought in the fact that Pauline, although she 
had apparently everything to satisfy her and to 
make her happy, yet was not satisfied, was not 
happy. Was her own lot so inferior after all? 

Someone in the convent was playing sweetly 
on the violin. The frail quivering notes floated 
out across the garden, speaking to her very soul. 
Tears stole unbidden into her eyes. Life seemed 
so big a thing, so infinitely complex and variable! 
There were many to whom one could turn for ac¬ 
quaintance and pleasant conversation. But 
there were few soul companions. Barbara’s was 
an exquisite nature, and she longed for one to 
whom she might freely reveal the beauty of her 
hidden thoughts. For one who would never dis¬ 
appoint her. 

Six o’clock having come, little Marie rose 
stiffly and set to work to gather up the stray 
fragments of silk, the thread, needles and other 
articles which littered the tables and floor. Bar¬ 
bara and Florence pinned their unfinished 
draperies away in clean pieces of white cloth and 
laid them carefully in a cupboard. The form, di¬ 
vested of its elegance, was placed in a corner and 
a towel thrown over it, while Marie started to 
sweep with an energy that caused the dust to fly 
in a whirlwind of silk, feathers, and string. 


WHY CAN’T WE BE HAPPY? 


57 


They took turns in arranging themselves for 
the street before a small mirror above the wash- 
stand. Barbara noted with a slight pang of fear 
that her cheeks were daily growing thinner and 
more colorless. The paltry salary which she 
made at present was barely sufficient to keep 
body and soul together. And a tiny cough 
racked her slight form at times. She dreaded the 
hot weather in the stuffy workroom. 

“Cheer up, Barby,” said Florence soothingly. 
“I’m sure you’ll get more money after you’ve 
been here a few weeks longer. Of course I know 
it’s very hard to wait. But all things work out in 
the end if we’re patient and trusting. Why don’t 
you try a novena to St. Anthony? It’s nearing 
his Feast Day—the thirteenth, you know.” 

“I think I will, Florence. I’m glad you re¬ 
minded me. They say he’s very powerful. Al¬ 
though, of course, sometimes God doesn’t seem 
to want us to have what we ask for. Yes, I’ll try 
the novena.” 

“I think you should go and see the doctor, with 
that cough, Barbara,” Florence continued. 
“Why don’t you? I don’t believe you’re getting 
nourishment enough. One can’t expect to be 
well and strong working long hours in a stuffy 
atmosphere and then having nothing to eat. I’m 


58 


THE TOWN LANDING 


sure you’ll be ill if you don’t care for your¬ 
self.” 

Barbara raised a flushed face to her gentle 
companion. She did not reply, but desperate 
temptations were raging in her soul. And she 
thought as so many others have thought: There 
are those who suffer bitter injustice, poverty, 
sickness, unldndness, most cruel death, or a liv¬ 
ing death which is infinitely harder to meet, and 
God does not interfere. Why? She dismissed 
the temptation, remembering that through heroic 
sufferings souls in every age of the world’s his¬ 
tory had attained to sanctity and to a rcAvard 
above price. It was the mysterious way of 
Divine Providence in dealing with elect souls. 
She loiew that she would not exchange places 
with Pauline Metz, the pampered child of for¬ 
tune, if she might, for to Pauline had not been 
vouchsafed the priceless gift of faith. 

At the door the three girls parted, going their 
separate ways. They walked quickly, as those 
who having been imprisoned for a long time, are 
at last set free to enjoy the fresh air and sun¬ 
light. 

The streets were filled with people just get¬ 
ting out from their work. They hurried to and 
fro, jostling one another, but strangely cheerful. 


WHY CANT WE BE HAPPY? 


59 


No wonder, for they were going home. For 
most of them the cares and happenings of the day 
would be discussed about the cheerful table, 
where those whom they loved would understand 
and sympathize. 

Barbara smiled, for she was at peace just now. 


VI 


IN WHICH NOTHING HAPPENS 

‘‘ X CONFESS that I don’t know what came 
g over me,” Doctor Somers said to his friend 
George Barrows as they sat in the office of 
the former one afternoon of the following week. 
“But I went into a Catholic church for the first 
time in my life.” 

George was very much surprised at the ad¬ 
mission, and very much interested. He sat up¬ 
right in his chair and leaned forward. 

“Well, what did you think of it?” 

“Well, I found it rather grotesque. Pardon 
me if I hurt your feelings. Of course it was 
strange to me, and I confess I found some things 
ridiculous. I don’t pretend to understand the 
doctrines of the Church, however. Of course 
there’s some beauty there,” he conceded after a 
moment. “Now I noticed, for instance, the 
figure of a young monk. You’ve seen it over the 
main altar in St. Leonard’s Church? No? 
Well, I confess that there was something about 

60 


IN WHICH NOTHING HAPPENS 


61 


it that moved me strangely. What it was I can’t 
pretend to say. But I truly never experienced 
anything quite like the sensation. A sort of 
spell seemed to be cast over me, and I felt as if I 
were centuries away from the present and in an¬ 
other world. If life would bear out my feelings! 
But it doesn’t. Of course the emotion which 
overcame me was but the effect of a very beauti¬ 
ful object on my sensitive nature. I love beauty, 
and this thing—this monk—was beautiful.” 

“The Catholic Church,” replied his friend 
slowly, exhaling a whiff of fragrant smoke, “has 
always attracted those who are lovers of the 
beautiful. Of course you will admit that when 
you went into that church for the first time you 
were repelled a trifle by certain externals pecu¬ 
liarly characteristic of certain forms of art. To 
one who understands, everything in the ritual is 
fraught with mystic meaning, and all relate to 
the life and death of the divine Founder of the 
Church, Christ. All.” 

“Tell me—you go to Mass every morning?” 

“Yes. Have been going for more than a year 
now. And you’d be surprised if I were to tell 
you of the happiness I’ve absorbed from it. In 
fact it’s got to be so much a part of me that to be 
without it would leave something radically 
wrong with my day.” 



62 


THE TOWN LANDING 


Francis turned an interested countenance 
thoughtfully toward the ceiling and waited. 

“You see, the Mass is as old as Christianity. 
It has never changed. It’s the same all over the 
world, wherever there’s a Catholic altar. You’d 
appreciate it if you only understood. For it ap¬ 
peals to the most noble, the most exalted senti¬ 
ments of a man’s heart, besides bringing untold 
graces into his life. The priest at the altar is 
only a figure, for it is Christ Himself who is priest 
and victim. Oh, it’s wonderful to know that in 
the midst of a world that’s sordid and mercenary 
you can sometimes steal away from it all and 
steep your soul in the heights of Sacrifice. The 
Mass is a Sacrifice, offered for you and for me. 
And nothing is so necessary for us to learn in this 
world as the lesson of sacrifice. Life is filled 
with sacrifice for most of us, but to suffer in 
union with Christ is something sublime.” 

“What is it like, to receive Holy Commun¬ 
ion?” asked Francis, who was filled with curiosity 
concerning the things of which his friend had 
spoken so reverently. 

“Why, I couldn’t begin to explain what Holy 
Communion means to a man living in the midst 
of the busy world. You see. Holy Communion 
is the receiving of the Body and Blood of Christ 


IN WHICH NOTHING HAPPENS 


63 


together with His sacred Soul and Divinity. If 
it were not really Christ, what would be the use 
of receiving at all? What good could mere 
bread possibly do for the soul? But the Catholic 
knows that his soul is fed and strengthened by 
Holy Communion.” 

George paused a moment to whisper an ejacu¬ 
lation to the Spirit of all light and truth ere he 
ventured to explain Mysteries before which 
saints have paused at times with idle pen. Then 
he continued: 

“You’re a musician. You know what it’s like 
—after a hard week’s work listening to the 
groaning and the sighing of those who are in 
terrible bodily pain, after the sight of mangled 
limbs and flowing blood and the dying throes of 
men who cling to life as the sweetest possession 
they have—to sit in the orchestra at your favorite 
opera, with the lights lowered and exquisite 
strains of music stealing into the silent places of 
your soul, just the whisperings of angelic har¬ 
monies that lull every restless impulse to rest— 
and feast your eyes on the stage where a Vene¬ 
tian night is pictured in all its beauty. The soft 
swishing of gondolas comes faintly to your ear; 
a lovely princess all in white leans from a win¬ 
dow, where beneath her trellised balcony her 



64 


THE TOWN LANDING 


lover serenades. And above all a perfect moon; 
old garlanded porticoes hung with flowers; and 
through all the silent moving streets of silver 
water. Oh, what’s the use? I couldn’t do justice 
to it if I tried a thousand years. That’s but a 
poor expression of the rapture which a man feels 
after Communion. It takes one who understands 
to realize and appreciate. It’s described by 
various writers in the holy books. If you’d like 
to read for yourself-” 

“Thanks, no,” said Francis hastily. “They 
bore me to death. But I think I realize a little 
what you mean, and the description is not so bad. 
But to one who’s on the outside looking in it’s 
hardly clear.” Then he continued. “I’ve 
thought that it must be awfully hard to go to 
confession to a man like yourself. I could under¬ 
stand that less.” 

“Well, it’s hard sometimes,” his friend replied. 
“But if you’re in earnest, it makes all the differ¬ 
ence in the world. You see, when once you 
realize that the priest only represents Christ, and 
that the confessional is another Calvary, and you 
think of the Precious Blood dripping softly over 
your soul, stained and dusty after the day in the 
street, and you hear the whispered words of ab¬ 
solution and Imow that you’re white as snow 



IN WHICH NOTHING HAPPENS 


65 


though you’re a man among men, that you’re 
just as innocent as a little maiden on her First 
Communion day—why, there’s something worth 
while! And of course everything is buried for¬ 
ever in the great Heart of Christ. You’ll never 
hear from it again. For a little discomfort and 
possible humiliation you’re fit to meet your God 

if He should suddenly call. Why, it’s- But 

you can perhaps see what I’m trying to say?” 

“I think I see.” 

But Francis made a little grimace when he 
thought of the “possible humiliation.” It all 
sounded very nice and plausible when George 
talked so smoothly between the fragrant whiffs 
of his pipe. But the recollection of the grim con¬ 
fessionals which he had noticed back there in the 
old church made Francis shiver and change the 
subject. 

He decided that it would be the last time he 
would discuss the subject of religion with 
George. At the first good inspiration he turned 
resolutely away. He was unwilling to pay the 
price of peace, a price that was terrifying, that 
meant the relinquishing of the ease and freedom 
of a conscience whose god was self. 

Francis thought that contrition must exact a 
toll from the soul. There was sadness enough in 



66 


THE TOWN LANDING 


life, was there not? His thoughts drifted to the 
lines of his favorite poet to refute these more 
sober reflections: 

For no man under the shy lives twice, outliving his day; 
And grief is a grievous thing, and a man hath enough of 
his tears. 

Why should he labor and bring fresh grief to blacken his 
years? 




VII 

THE SPELL OF BEAUTY 

B arbara, walking home in the pleasant 
twilight about a month later, paused over 
the rustic bridge in the Public Garden to 
drink in the quiet beauty of nature. The grass 
was soft as velvet, of a vivid green, with flower¬ 
beds gay by contrast. The lazy swanboats 
floated slowly beneath the arched bridges and 
past miniature islands of rock where verdant 
mosses clung for footing among the wildflowers. 
A few canoes and rowboats glided in and out, 
making a pretty picture. 

In the near distance rose the tall blocks of the 
business and residential sections. They were like 
giant monuments fringing in this pleasant bit of 
valley. The sky was mildly blue, with a few 
fleecy clouds trailing across, and an occasional 
bird winging its joyous way to some chosen 
haunt as instinct prompted. Now and then one 
of these little creatures uttered a shrill cry. The 
leaves of the ash and beech trees trembled 
slightly in the light breezes. 

67 


68 


THE TOWN LANDING 


Barbara thought that it was a lovely spot, not 
unsuggestive of a Garden of long ago where our 
First Parents walked in the peerless bloom of 
innocence. 

She drew out her pay envelope and felt of it. 
It seemed unusually bulky to-night. The 
thought of a possible increase in salary made the 
girls heart flutter a little beneath her plain ging¬ 
ham dress. 

She tore the envelope open hastily and found 
to her surprise that there was a note within. 
^Wondering, she unfolded the bit of paper and 
read: 

“As the season is now growing dull, your ser¬ 
vices will be no longer required. If you desire 
to return in September ...” 

Barbara read the note, twice, three, four times. 
Then she crushed it to small fragments in her 
hand. She leaned heavily on the stone paling 
of the bridge and tried to realize what had hap¬ 
pened to her. 

This was the last straw. Already she had 
spent the last of her past week’s salary on a 
much-needed pair of shoes. The whole world, 
the pleasant garden, people, things, seemed to be 
whirling about. She felt sick and dizzy. Then 
she noticed that pedestrians were staring at her 
as they passed by. Quickly she recovered from 


THE SPELL OF BEAUTY 


69 


her momentary weakness and moved on. When 
one is in misery it is difficult to hide the pain 
from inquisitive eyes that seem to pry into the 
most secret depths of the heart. It is an ad¬ 
ditional sorrow to feel that one’s interior is 
known, is guessed by those who merely analyze it 
from a psychological viewpoint and pass on with¬ 
out bestowing even pity upon the victim of God’s 
designs. 

Barbara walked on. A little pain darted 
through her head so wearied with planning dur¬ 
ing the past months. She dreaded to return to 
the poor boarding house, wflere everyone would 
instantly divine all, and where each would pity 
her. Sometimes pity can be very hard to bear. 
Her kind and loyal friends at Mrs. Tomer’s 
were poor and hardworking like herself. Most 
of them had others who were in some manner de¬ 
pendent upon them, and she could not bear to 
accept their aid. 

She stumbled along for a considerable dis¬ 
tance, walking across the Common and then 
turning in the direction of the Esplanade. Here, 
tired in soul and body, she seated herself wearily 
on a bench. 

The green water glistened and lapped at her 
feet. Barbara in her tired soul dimly wondered 
why more people who had not faith to guide 


70 


THE TOWN LANDING 


them did not end it all when tragic sorrows 
came. 

She became aware of a slender girlish figure 
swinging down the promenade with a small dog 
attached to a jeweled leash. She did not raise 
her eyes, however, until the figure came over be¬ 
side her and a hand was laid on her arm. 

“Don’t you remember me?” asked a voice that 
Barbara recognized as that of Pauline Metz, 
Madame Laurier’s customer. 

Pauline sat down on the bench beside Barbara 
and put her arm about her waist. 

“Now tell me what the trouble is.” Pauline 
had noticed the dejection of the little figure hud¬ 
dled on the bench and the fixed tearless stare in 
Barbara’s eyes. 

Barbara, recognizing Pauline, smiled grate¬ 
fully and drew the note from the folds of her 
dress. 

“I declare! It’s a shame!” Pauline said, flush¬ 
ing angrily. “But never mind this horrid thing. 
Something’s bound to turn up. Perhaps I can 
help you. I’ll ask someone whom I know.” 

Barbara brightened perceptibly. “I’m sure 
that’s very kind of you,” she said. 

“Kind? It’s only what a human being would 
do. You poor child! And you’re all tired out 
and half sick. You’ve simply got to go and see 


THE SPELL OF BEAUTY 


71 


the doctor and get some medicine right away. 
Yes, got to! I’m used to having my own way. 
Daddy says that I’m spoiled, and perhaps I am. 
But you’ve got to mind me. I know a young 
man, a friend, who is a physician. He’s very 
kind, and I shall tell him about you beforehand 
so that you needn’t worry about expense. Now 
I do hope you’re not too proud.” 

Remembering her painful experiences of the 
past weary months, Barbara consented, for there 
was nothing else to be done. ‘‘When I get work, 
I shall repay your friend,” she said. “For, of 
course, I must get work somehow.” 

“Of course. But just now do as I say, and 
everything will be all right.” Pauline hastily 
wrote a name and address on a daintily engraved 
card and handed it to the girl. 

“Now promise me that you’ll be obedient and 
go to see the doctor right away—that is, within a 
day or so. And please let me hear from you.” 
Pauline added her own address to the memo¬ 
randum. 

“By the way,” she continued, “would you like 
to join my Sunday-school class? Not that you’d 
learn much from me, but you’d have a nice time 
and meet some of the girls. I’m High Church, 
you see, although frankly I confess that I don’t 
quite Imow why or what it all means. Would you 


72 


THE TOWN LANDING 


care to join after such a poor recommendation 
of myself?” 

Barbara smiled through her tears. “I—^you 
see, while I thank you very much I don’t think I 
will accept. You see, I’m a Catholic.” 

“Yes, but so’m I,” rejoined Pauline. “It’s all 
the same. You’re a Homan Catholic, and I’m 
just a Catholic, I suppose. We wear the nicest 
vestments, and all that. You’d never know the 
difference. Really, I’d love to have you come.” 

“Thank you, but I couldn’t,” Barbara pro¬ 
tested. “And, please, it’s not the same at all. 
Please excuse me, but it’s not the same. Of 
course the vestments may look the same, and 
other things. But the externals don’t matter so 
much. You haven’t got the Blessed Sacrament 
and Confession and the Blessed Virgin in the 
same way that we have. And you haven’t got 
the Holy Father, Pius XI. It’s not the same, 
you see. Please pardon me if I seem ungrateful 
when you’ve been so kind.” 

Pauline looked puzzled for a little space. 
Then her brow cleared. She looked thought¬ 
fully out over the moving body of water and was 
silent for awhile. When she spoke again her 
tone was strangely altered. 

“I told daddy so,” she said reproachfully. “I 
just knew it wasn’t the same. You see, we had 


THE SPELL OF BEAUTY 


73 


a maid once—her name was Clare. Well, she 
told me some things about your faith. I used to 
admire her beads and all that. And sometimes 
I accompanied her down to the village, at our 
summer place, when she went to confession. I 
used to watch Clare going into the box recol¬ 
lected and sorrowful, and coming out with a look 
of—I don’t know what. And then one day, 
while she was praying at the altar, I went in. 
The priest was very nice, although he seemed 
surprised when I told him about myself. He 
told me to pray, but I never did. I asked daddy 
a few leading questions, but he always put me 
off. And now—I’ve met you!” 

Barbara was deeply interested in the strange 
recital of her newmade friend. She sat upright 
on the bench and a glad light crept into her clear 
eyes. Her own trouble faded quite away. And 
this was the girl, apx)arently worldly and 
pleasure-loving, whom nothing in society had 
been able to satisfy! 

“What became of Clare?” asked Barbara after 
awhile. 

“Oh, Clare entered the Order of Marie Re- 
paratrice in New York. She’s there now, I sup¬ 
pose. But daddy made me promise never to see 
her. I don’t suppose I could see her, though. 
But maybe I could talk with her.” 



74 


THE TOWN LANDING 


‘‘And did you think that you’d like to be a 
Catholic?” Barbara asked. 

“A Roman Catholic? Well, perhaps I did— 
once. But I seemed to get all over that. How¬ 
ever, I don’t think it would take very much to 
convert me. Why don’t you try?” 

Barbara, surprised and exultant, looked into 
the calm face that yet seemed to mask its feelings 
with a gay smile. Something told her that here 
was to be one of God’s choice flowers in the 
earthly paradise. 

“Why don’t you ask me some questions?” she 
asked. 

“Well, that’s what I’ve been wanting to do. I 
asked a couple of girls once, and do you know, 
they put me off just as daddy did. Funny! For 
I always heard that your Church was noted for 
stealing people into your fold. But I didn’t find 
it that way. Either they didn’t know the answer 
to the things that I asked or they weren’t in¬ 
terested in helping a soul. And I was puzzled 
a bit. Then there were others who seemed 
anxious to conceal the fact. Why? Isn’t this a 
free country? Why be ashamed of a thing you 
honestly believe? Of course, these are not repre¬ 
sentative members of your Church, but somehow 
they hurt the cause a lot. Don’t you think so? 
There are lots of hypocrites. I confess I’m one. 


THE SPELL OF BEAUTY 


75 


because I don’t care a fig for High Church and 
yet I’m teaching Sunday school. I don’t go to 
Confession although sometimes I think I’d like 
to. The rector hasn’t gone to that extreme. He 
says maybe it will come. Fudge!” 

Barbara, intensely interested, had nothing to 
say, but waited eagerly as Pauline went on. 

‘T know someone else—just like me. He’s a 
hypocrite, too, although he doesn’t dream that 
I know it. He thinks I’m just a spoiled simple¬ 
ton. But I see through his ideas. He’s drifting 
and fooling around with books, but he doesn’t 
know any more about religion than I do.” 

Pauline consulted the little jeweled watch on 
her wrist and rose. ‘‘Well, dear, I must go now. 
Don’t you dare worry, and be sure to do as I’ve 
told you. Everything is bound to come out all 
right.” 

Having parted from her newfound friend, 
Barbara walked slowly back to Charles Street 
and turned in the direction of old St. Joseph’s. 
Her heart was very light. Everything seemed 
to be interesting along the way. The children 
were unusually merry on the sidewalks and even 
the dingiest shops attracted her. 

She walked up McLean Street. On the 
porches of the Massachusetts General Hospital 
she saw the sick reclining in their chairs. The 



76 


THE TOWN LANDING 


white porticoes covered with ivy were illumined 
by the setting rays. It was good to feel the 
warm blood coursing in one’s strong limbs and 
to know that one had youth and strength on one’s 
I side in spite of adversities. 

She pushed open the basement door of old St. 
Joseph’s. The red lamp flickered fitfully before 
the tabernacle, casting circles of light about the 
sanctuary. The attractive center altar, newly 
decorated in its fresh garments of white and gold, 
incited her to prayer. She hastened forward and 
knelt at the railing. 

On the crimson background of the altar was 
embroidered in golden letters the mystic word: 
Jesus. Perhaps never before had the girl so 
tasted the sweetness of that honeyed name. 
There was no one else near. In a moment of im¬ 
molation Barbara flung out her arms in imita¬ 
tion of the Divine Victim on the crucifix above 
the tabernacle, offering to Him the entire sacri¬ 
fice of all, even life itself, for the greater glory of 
God and, something impelled her to add: “for 
the conversion of some soul.” 

From the street subdued noises stole into the 
quiet of the sanctuary. They were rather ap¬ 
pealing than otherwise, for they served to accen¬ 
tuate the peace of Christ. Time seemed to be re¬ 
volving around Eternity. Barbara murmured 


THE SPELL OF BEAUTY 


77 


softly: “In a desert land, and where there is no 
way and no water. So I have come before 
Thee.’’ 

The words of the beautiful and consoling 
Psalm, which reveals the yearning of the thirsty 
soul for its God, out of whom it can never be 
satisfied, lulled all her restless fears and pains to 
rest. 


VIII 


A MESSAGE FROM HOME 

lope and tore it open. He read: “Your 
mother is very ill.” 

A sudden pain stabbed at his heart. For a 
moment things seemed to be whirling madly 
about him. He read the message twice, thrice. 
“Your mother . . .” 

Only once do such words sound shrill and 
ominous in the ears of a man, shaking his soul to 
its inmost fibers with fear and dismay. 

Mechanically Francis prepared to leave the 
city. Stuffing the necessary articles into his 
traveling bag, he rang for the maid. “Martha, 
IVe got to go home,” he said stolidly. “I don’t 
know just when I may return. My mother’s— 
ill.” He could not, would not say “very” ill, 
although those were the horrid words which the 
bit of yellow paper had emblazoned on his soul. 

His thoughts raced ahead to the tiny railroad 
station, to a quiet Main Street that he knew and 

78 


T 


ELEGRAM, sir. 

Doctor Somers took the yellow enve- 


A MESSAGE FROM HOME 


79 


whose every monument he had memorized by 
heart, down a turn in the road to a white home¬ 
stead standing well back, with the river flowing 
a short distance behind. How far away those few 
miles seemed! With gaunt fear like a specter 
stalking before, they were multiplied many 
times. 

Francis ran down the steps two at a time and 
entered his car. A street piano was grinding 
out popular airs on the corner of Bowdoin and 
Beacon streets as he swung past the State House 
in the direction of the blue haze to westward. 

People walking slowly along seemed mere 
puppets on a sorry stage. At the crossing of 
Charles Street a traffic officer delayed him a 
seemingly interminable length of time. Every 
instant was an eternity in the painful conflict 
that surged in his breast. 

The city left well behind, he came out into a 
coimtry road and an hour later was driving up 
the main street of his native town. On both 
sides the pleasant fields stretched away; the 
apple trees had shed their perfumed pink blos¬ 
soms and a thick carpet of petals lay on the 
grass. The simple white country homesteads, 
set in the midst of well-tilled fields, stood at brief 
intervals along the way. Here and there patient 
stooping figures bent over long rows of vege- 


80 


THE TOWN LANDING 


tables or pruned the rugged vines. An ancient 
and tattered scarecrow seemed to nod in sym¬ 
pathetic fashion to the young man who drove at 
a frantic speed past the field where it kept 
honored watch. 

Francis passed the old white Methodist meet¬ 
ing-house where, as a boy, he had worshiped— 
where, seated on a stiff-backed bench, he had 
fallen asleep to the sonorous droning of the 
preacher and lulled by the somber monotony of 
white-washed walls. The gilt weathercock on the 
steeple was sadly tarnished—that was all the dif¬ 
ference between the long ago and now. Behind 
the church was the same row of sheds for the 
horses and buggies when on Sunday a handful 
of worshipers drove to the old meeting-house on 
the green. It all looked singularly stiff and un¬ 
attractive to Francis, who passed quickly by 
without bestowing a second glance upon it. 

The late afternoon sunshine was mellow over 
the land. Here and there in the meadows 
sj)otted cows were peacefully chewing the cud 
and now and then lowed faintly. 

Francis plunged into a drive where on either 
side rambling stone walls beamed in friendly 
fashion on the wanderer returned. In the cool 
deep meadows on all sides of the house low 
gnarled fruit trees dipped their aged branches 



A MESSAGE FROM HOME 


81 


in purple clover tops. There was a sweet frag¬ 
rance over all, but he did not heed it. 

Suddenly into his hands was thrust a wet 
nozzle, and he felt the touch of long silken ears. 
He dropped his bag and embraced the faithful 
companion and friend of his boyhood days: 
“Down, Brutus!” he said. “You’re covering me 
with dust.” 

The noble St. Bernard gamboled before his 
master albeit his legs were now becoming stiff 
with age. A moment after man and dog came 
up to the front porch. 

There was no crepe on the door. A sigh of 
relief escaped Francis. He leaned for a mo¬ 
ment on a pillar to get his breath. The brass 
knocker on the door glinted in the rosy sunshine. 
He entered the quaint low hall with its white 
window seats and covering of chintz. The place 
was strangely silent. 

He pushed open the sitting-room door. On 
the mantel he saw the same stuffed birds, a mock¬ 
ingbird and an oriole. There were spotless folds 
of white mosquito netting draped over the gilt 
frames of the family portraits. 

He closed the door softly and set down his 
valise. Then he ascended the stairs slowly, feel¬ 
ing that his mother might be asleep. The door 
of her room was slightly ajar, and he heard the 


82 


THE TOWN LANDING 


low murmur of voices. No, she was not asleep 
or they would be silent. A strange perfume of 
drugs came to his nostrils. 

He entered noiselessly. There were three 
figures in the room. One was a nurse in white 
uniform, with a cap over her fair hair. The 
second was a man in clerical garb. Francis saw 
with a start that he wore a Roman collar, and 
recognized him as the young priest from St. 
Theodore’s Catholic chapel. 

The third was a motionless figure on the bed. 

One swift fearful glance told Francis that he 
had come just too late to bid farewell to her 
whom he loved so dearly. His mother slept. 

In the first moments of his anguish he ad¬ 
vanced to meet the priest. He saw that he held 
in his hand a piece of silken ribbon, purple and 
white. It was a stole. 

Then he brushed past the priest and advanced 
to the bedside. His mother was very fair and 
young. Her slender hands were folded about a 
small brass crucifix. There was a lingering smile 
on her lips. 

Francis became aware of a man’s voice speak¬ 
ing. ‘‘There was a fatal accident. Your mother 
sent for me and expressed her desire of being re¬ 
ceived into the Church. She was in earnest' 
about it, for it had been in her mind for some 


A MESSAGE FROM HOME 


83 


time. I instructed her briefly, prepared her, and 
she died in peace.’’ 

The priest was a young man too, and he 
looked with pity on the stricken figure before 
him. Francis was silent. He was suffering 
terribly, from grief, anger, jealousy, from a 
vague desire to penetrate the mystery of his 
mother’s death. 

‘‘Of course she will be buried from the 
church,” the priest was saying in low steady 
tones. “If you desire to make any arrangements 
I shall be pleased to conform with them as far as 
possible. And should you wish to have prayers 

at the grave-” Francis turned, almost 

fiercely. 

They had left the chamber of death and pro¬ 
ceeded below. “But my mother was a 
Methodist,” he said in a sort of suppressed pas¬ 
sion. “It was my father’s church—always. She 
attended there when I was a child, and she’s got 
to be buried from there. I’m sorry this thing 
should have happened. I’m sure it’s all a fear¬ 
ful mistake. Someone must have- Her mind 

must have been strangely altered, for I’m sure 
she never cared anything about the Catholic 
faith.” 

The priest was very calm in so difficult a 
situation. 





84 


THE TOWN LANDING 


“It was her dying wish to be buried by the 
Church into which I received her but an hour ago 
and at her own request. She died a Catholic, no 
matter about the past. As such she should not 
be denied the sacred privileges which are hers by 
right.’’ 

The priest was very gentle. He pitied 
Francis and he understood the loneliness and 
pain which he was suffering in this extremity. 

Francis hid his face in his hands and wept 
from sheer misery. In imagination he saw the 
funeral train passing up the aisle of the Catholic 
church while all the village wondered and gos¬ 
siped. His pride was outraged. Things would 
go on, strange mysterious rites, utterly unintelli¬ 
gible to him and to others. His mother, who in 
all her life, to his knowledge, had never entered 
a Catholic church, would be carried there and 
laid at the foot of the altar. For her the little 
bell of St. Theodore’s would toll sadly over the 
valley, its silver echoes thrown back from the 
purple hills, calling the faithful to prayer for the 
passing of a soul to the great Hereafter. For her 
all the mysterious rubrics of the Church would 
be exercised, while the mourners, nearly all of 
them good Methodists, sat stiffly erect striving to 
compromise by something like good manners. 

“My God,” groaned the young man, “this is 


A MESSAGE FROM HOME 


85 


terrible! How can I stand it?” And aloud he 
pleaded with this young priest that he would 
change the inexorable sentence. 

“But—but—you don’t know what you’re ask¬ 
ing!” he said. “You can’t understand. You see, 
we haven’t anything in common with the 
Catholic Church. We-” he broke off in ab¬ 

ject misery. 

“But I do know. I do understand,” the priest 
replied pityingly. “It is asking a tremendous 
sacrifice of you to accept these conditions. But 
you will make it—for her sake. Life is all made 
up of sacrifices. We all have to make them. 
Many times I must do things I would much 
rather not do. I have made sacrifices of things 
that were nearest and dearest to me. It all comes 
out right in the end if we do our part. And it 
may be that if you knew the Church as She is 
you would feel better about this. Your mother 
felt that the Church has much to offer to those 
who are in the last extremities. The Catholic 
Church is the safest Church in which to live, as 
it is the only Church in which to die.” 

“Well”—the effort was exceedingly hard to 
Francis—“it shall be as you say—since she 
wished it so. Only tell me—what my mother 
said to you.” 

“There was not time to say much, except 




86 


THE TOWN LANDING 


under the sacramental seal. That I am not at 
liberty to divulge to you. But this much I may 
say. She had long been attracted to the Church. 
Like many others she had postponed putting her 
desire into execution. God’s ways are not ours. 
Perhaps He knew that by living longer she 
might forget the good inspiration, and so His 
call came suddenly. I am very sorry for you. I 
too know what it means to be without a mother. 
But I believe that I have her in Heaven. And 
of course Catholics have the Blessed Virgin. 
They have in reality two Mothers.” 

Francis thought somewhat bitterly, ‘‘How 
does he know that his mother still lives some¬ 
where? That there is a Heaven? For in the 
last half-hour it seems that everything is 
chaos.” 

The priest went away, a gentle dignified figure, 
along the white road hedged with fragrant 
blooms. His heart was heavy for the soul of this 
young man. He knelt a long long time that 
evening before the shrine of the Blessed Virgin 
in his little chapel at the crest of the hill. He im¬ 
plored Her who was the Mother of Christ to 
intercede for the soul of the departed who for 
some few years had thrust aside God’s grace to 
clutch it eagerly at the eleventh hour. And he 
prayed fervently for Francis that he would find 


A MESSAGE FROM HOME 


87 


peace and grace and light to see God’s will and 
to follow it. 

Through the opened window the beeches whis¬ 
pered their loving nocturnal adoration of their 
sacramental Saviour. The tall purple moun¬ 
tains looked in on the solitary watcher at the 
altar. The crickets and treetoads took up their 
querulous repining in the adjacent boughs and 
meadows. God’s holy peace rested over all. 

“Memorare, memorare, O dulcis Virgo 
Maria!” pleaded this devout soul at the feet of 
his Heavenly Mother. Again and again his 
pleading accents broke the stillness of the holy 
place. And the loving queen and Maiden 
seemed to incline her fair and gentle countenance 
toward this son of her love and to hold out her 
maternal arms with more intense yearning, as if 
she would bestow upon him all the graces that 
he sought and more. 


IX 


IS THERE A HEAVEN? 

F rancis spent a few days in the old 
homestead after the funeral, looking over 
his mother’s effects and making plans for 
the disposal of the furniture. There was but one 
thing left to do, and that was to sell the old place 
as soon as possible. He could not bear to think 
of entering these rooms when she was missing. 

He wandered in solitary fashion from room 
to room, pausing longest in those spots most en¬ 
deared to him by her memory. In this pleasant 
window overlooking the cornpatch she had sat of 
old with the darning basket, assiduously repair¬ 
ing the mischief wrought by active little feet 
which had clambered from the topmost branches 
of the pear trees to the old stone wall, and raced 
over the dusty roads in competition with the 
flivvers, which were just then something new in 
Hillcrest. 

Here, from the sunny dining-room, he could 
look across to the little burying ground and 

88 


IS THERE A HEAVEN? 


89 


barely discern the tall white shaft of marble on 
which were inscribed his father’s name and that 
of his baby sister Hilda. He was the last of his 
family. He wept silently. 

To George Harrows, who had come down from 
the city to spend a few hours with him, he spoke 
rather freely of his emotions. There was some¬ 
thing very soothing about George; he was like 
a woman in his gift of sympathy. It comforted 
the stricken young man to unveil his feelings 
without reserve to one who would not deem him 
unmanly. 

“Of course, it was awfully hard to go through 
with the funeral,” Francis confessed. “It was 
like a weird dream from which I have never quite 
awakened. It was only the second time that I 
had ever entered a Catholic church in my life, 
you see. Fortunately I managed to go through 
with it. But the relatives—whew!” Francis 
whistled softly as he recalled the very manifest 
disedification on the countenances of a score or 
more of his mother’s people. It had been a big 
ordeal, all in all, although a little thought had 
crept unbidden into his mind as to whether, after 
all, there must not be something in a Church which 
could excite such antipathy after so many cen¬ 
turies of its existence. 

Francis looked across the pleasant fields en- 


90 


THE TOWN LANDING 


closing God’s Acre and sighed heavily. He was 
very lonely. Then he said: 

“Life’s a strange thing, isn’t it? You never 
know what’s coming next. I suppose that for 
each of us there are things ahead we do not pos¬ 
sibly dream of. Friendship is a strange thing; 
love’s a stranger thing. You go through the 
world for so many years loving some one near 
and dear to you, and suddenly he or she is 
snatched away. You know nothing of the pass¬ 
ing out. Only that the void is there and the chair 
vacant. You can have as many acquaintances as 
you wish; friends, no. Only four or five. Really 
only about one to whom the workings of your 
soul lie open, who will never fail you, and whose 
sympathies are your very own. Do you recall 
Emerson’s Essay on Friendship? ‘Friendship 
is the secret of the universe. You may thread 
the town, you may wander in the country, and 
none shall ever speak of it. Yet thought is every¬ 
where busy about it.’ And he goes on to say 
that the human heart is very inexperienced. 
‘Many are the dangers to be encountered in this 
friendship—equinoctial gales and coral reefs ere 
he may sail before the constant trades.’ And 
love is even stranger.” 

George bowed assent. 

And Francis continued: “We are constituted 



IS THERE A HEAVEN? 


91 


of frail material. Sometimes things grow fear¬ 
fully tiresome to me. All the happenings of life. 
You get up in the morning and go to work. You 
meet people and converse, you smile and you 
frown, and you listen. You sigh and you forget. 
It’ s one thing after another. Where’s the use of 
it all when it ends like this?” He pointed with a 
slender hand toward the white slab of marble 
gleaming away across the fields. 

“Why, to make us aspire to something higher, 
something purer than earth,” replied his friend. 
“You recall the disciples of Plato? Those youths 
from Athens, hearing the great philosopher dis¬ 
course so sweetly of the joys of death, and think¬ 
ing to reach those sweets the sooner, cast them¬ 
selves from the cliffs of the Aegean Sea. Of 
course if you were a Catholic, Francis, you’d 
understand a great deal more clearly what I 
mean. The Saints were always thinking about 
death, and, far from making them morose or un- 
happy, it made them more joyous than you or 
I.” 

Francis sighed as he thought of his dear de¬ 
parted, wondering if she could have been happy 
at the approach of death. She who had so loved 
life, who had been so much a part of it. . . . 

He tried to grasp at the recollection of her as 
one does at a frail butterfly that floats lightly 


92 


THE TOWN LANDING 


past. Alas, it was useless. Between him and her 
sweet soul there rose a gray barrier like a cloud. 
It was sweet-smelling incense that floated up 
from a little swaying silver boat, held by an 
acolyte clothed in black cassock and white sur¬ 
plice. Then another, a taller figure, took the cen¬ 
ser from the hands of the boy and advanced to 
the foot of the casket where his lady mother 
slept, throwing about her a soft haze of smoke 
that hid her yet more completely from view. 
Francis was terribly lonely as he recalled this 
final scene. 

When George had gone back to the city on 
the last train, Francis wandered out of the house 
that now seemed so barren, so almost sinister. 
He wandered through the lane beyond the gar¬ 
den and struck into a path that led to the river’s 
brink. 

In his boyhood they had called this spot the 
Town Landing, for here the canoes and row¬ 
boats were moored, and here the village boys 
fished from a miniature pier. 

Now the old Landing had fallen into disuse. 
The water lapped hungrily at the tall green 
rushes that dipped and swayed at touch of the 
waves. All was strangely quiet save for this 
gentle sound. In the warm summer sunlight the 
pleasant fields dipped away behind Francis; they 


IS THERE A HEAVEN? 


93 


were dotted with daisies and buttercups. Away 
out on the tranquil bosom of the river was a row¬ 
boat with a solitary human figure in repose. 
Here and there through the feathery treetops 
rose the red chimneys of ancient manor houses, 
now closed. The town was somewhat sleepy of 
late years. The old families were scattered here 
and there. It was almost a dream village, where 
bees hummed close to one’s ear and the tolling of 
bells sounded somewhere on the other side of the 
river. The peace of God was all about. 

Francis was not religious, but he worshiped 
beauty, such beauty as that which lay at his feet, 
that lapped and sucked at the reeds and willows, 
that stirred in the perfumed boughs of the trees, 
that hummed in his ear and leaned over him in 
dim shadows. 

A bit of his favorite, Swinburne, came to him 
in this peaceful, drowsy spot, and he clutched it 
eagerly: 

I found in dreams a place of wind and flowers. 

Full of sweet trees and color of glad grass. 

In midst whereof there was 
A lady clothed like summer with sweet hours. 

Something bright glittered in the sweet glad 
grass at Francis’ feet. He stooped and picked it 
up. 


94 


THE TOWN LANDING 


It was a tiny silver medal which bore the 
image of a Lady. There was an inscription, 
somewhat blurred by dampness, which he read 
after he had wiped it carefully on his handker¬ 
chief: “Mater Immaculata.” 


X 


FRANCIS AND BARBARA 

see, you cannot possibly go on like 
j[ this,” Dr. Somers said, as he drank in 
eagerly the details of the fair young face 
before him. 

By what possible miracle of good fortune this 
thing which he had so desired had come to pass, 
he hardly dared to think. Was the medal which 
he had picked up a sort of charm, perhaps ? Had 
it brought the girl, Barbara, to his door? That 
first night, when he had caught a momentary 
glimpse of her passing down the moonlit street, 
he had hardly thought to see her again. And 
here she was! 

“You will be ill,” he continued. “And then— 
what?” 

His voice was kind, Barbara thought. His 
face was kinder. She looked up, only to drop 
her eyes quickly. He was gazing intently at her; 
it was as if he were analyzing her very soul. 

Barbara could not know that Dr. Somers was 
recalling a conversation which he had held with 

95 


96 


THE TOWN LANDING 


his friend but a few hours before on the subject 
of friendship. “You may thread the town, you 
may wander in the country . . . and somewhere 
you shall find it.” 

Barbara spoke in a low sweet tone of voice. 
“But, Doctor, you see, I have no work at 
present, and my money is very nearly gone.” 

It was hard to confide her sorrows to a 
stranger, a very young and handsome stranger 
at that. 

“I couldn’t possibly go away from the city, 
and I have no place to which I might go. If I 
remain here, I may find work. I must find work. 
If I go away, my money will soon be gone.” 

He was silent for a long time. The girl sat 
with doAvncast eyes so that he could the better 
watch her face, with its pensive and troubled air, 
which caused the delicate outline to droop a little. 
Long dark lashes shaded the eyes now striving 
to keep back the quick tears. The firm and 
slender hands were clasped nervously about a 
worn little handbag, and the slender feet were 
set together in a straight line that barely showed 
how shabby were the small and graceful shoes. 
Francis decided that Barbara was a lady, and for 
this reason he felt the more singularly drawn 
toward her. 

He was trying to think out a plan whereby he 


FRANCIS AND BARBARA 


97 


might do something for her without causing her 
to suffer. And of a sudden came a vision. 

The vision of a fair and pleasant spot where 
tall meadow grasses swept the daisied billows 
toward blue dancing waves. It was here that 
he had found the mysterious medal which, he 
somehow fancied^ had brought him this unex¬ 
pected piece of luck. The Town Landing! The 
very thing! Somehow Barbara fitted into the 
picture that he swiftly formed in his mind. Hill- 
crest went with her somehow. Now how to fit 
her into this delicious setting! 

Francis looked straight into the girl’s eyes, 
and said in a compelling way that was habitual 
to him on occasions: ‘T think that I know a way 
out of the difficulty. I know a good old soul in 
a place not very far from here, a nice quiet 
country place. She would be only too delighted 
to have a young companion for a while, for she 
buried her only son in the war. She’s all alone 
in the world now, and she’d do anything for me. 
She’s very lonely, now that JMalcolm’s gone. She 
lives in the nicest little cottage you ever saw, set 
in the midst of green fields. It would be a splen¬ 
did plan for both of you for awhile. What do 
you say?” 

‘'But-” Barbara was a bit troubled, despite 

the fragrant vision that unfolded before her tired 



98 


THE TOWN LANDING 


heart. ‘‘But how could I repay her? For I’m 
not used to much of any work except sewing, 
and-” 

“My dear little girl”—Dr. Somers began to feel 
very important and venerable already in his new 
role—“just leave it to me. Between us weTl fix 
this thing up so that three people—that is, two 
people will benefit by the arrangement. To me 
it seems an admirable idea. Now don’t be stub¬ 
born or I’ll be disappointed in you, for I believe 
you’re a sensible girl. See if my plan doesn’t 
work out all right. We’ll have you nice and rosy 
by fall. You’ll be raking hay in a big apron and 

sunbonnet with-” He was about to say “with 

that pretty hair all streaming down in the sun¬ 
light like a veil,” but fortunately stopped in 
time. Francis was lonely after his mother’s 
going. He had dreamed of Barbara, and here 
she was! The medal had indeed worked a 
- charm! 

Barbara brightened perceptibly. The idea 
seemed suddenly glorious. And she believed that 
she could make herself very useful in the wee 
cottage set in the verdant fields. 

“Do you know Stevenson’s Garden of 
Verses?” she asked, with a radiant glance toward 
him. “You recalled it to my mind when you 
mentioned the hay; 




FRANCIS AND BARBARA 


99 


what a joy to clamber there. 

Oh, what a place for play. 

With the sweet, the dim, the dusty air. 

The happy hills of hay!** 

Francis beamed approvingly upon her. This 
girl was more accomplished than he had thought. 
She read poetry. 

“That just expresses it!” he said happily. 
“Whew! I never thought I was so clever!” 
Whereat they both laughed like happy children. 
“I’m very fond of this good old lady of whom 
I told you. She’s somewhat prim, but you’ll like 
her. She’s true, and that’s all that matters. 
You’ll hear a lot of hymn tunes played on the 
old melodeon. She’s a perfectly good Methodist, 
you see. But then, her famous gingerbread and 
custards will more than make up for what you 
have to stand in the other line. You’re not by 
any chance Methodist, are you? For then you 
and she would get on famously about the hymns.' 
There’d be a chorus. You’re not Methodist, are 
you?” The last came inadvertently. 

Francis thought it would be jolly were 
Barbara of the religion which his family had held 

for generations, which his mother- He 

stopped suddenly in his trend of thought, while a 
dark sorrow took possession of him. His mother 
had not stayed a Methodist. At the last 

i 

9 f 


) > ) 



100 


THE TOWN LANDING 


hour of her life she had adjured the teaching of 
her fathers. . . . 

Barbara flushed. ‘T’m a Catholic,” she re¬ 
plied, looking firmly into the eyes of the young 
physician. 

Francis grew cold. His face fell, and a grim 
little line settled about his sensitive mouth. He 
was sorry that the girl was a Catholic. He would 
have preferred that she was anything else in the 
world, even a pagan. Strange obstinacy! Be¬ 
cause, really, why should it make any difference 
to him? And yet it did make a great deal of 
difference. He was upset for a moment. 

Then, for he was a gentleman, he said: ‘T beg 
your pardon. I didn’t mean to be rude. But 
I was thinking of something else.” 

He broke off awkwardly. Barbara was vaguely 
disappointed. Her eager anticipation died away. 
Perhaps God was trying her, and this sweet vi¬ 
sion was not to become real. 

Then Dr. Somers brightened again and re¬ 
sumed the conversation. ‘Tf you can be ready by 
to-morrow night,” he said, “I think I could man¬ 
age to get off between office hours and take you 
over to Hillcrest. It will be so much easier than 
a trip in a stuffy train. It’s only a short drive, 
anyhow. I think I can make it easily. Would 
you be willing to drop around here at six o’clock? 


FRANCIS AND BARBARA 


101 


You could arrange your things before then and 
have your trunk sent ahead. Is that all right?”' 

All right! Barbara felt that the sunshine had 
suddenly streamed over her, that she was trans¬ 
ported into a lovely land where all things beauti¬ 
ful lay about her for the asking. Tears came to 
her eyes, and she could not drive them back. 
After so many weeks of misery, of failure, of 
humiliations, of hunger, of stifling! Now came 
the reaction which happiness brings. 

“Don’t cry, little girl,” Francis said awk¬ 
wardly, for he could not stand a woman’s tears. 
“It’s nothing. I’m glad to do it for you, and I 
know you will be able to do a great deal in return 
for—for the good old soul to whom I am taking 
you. I’ll telephone her to-night. She’s lonely 
too!” 

“You see, Hillcrest is my old home,” he went 
on. “It’s a lovely spot. Sometimes I half wish 
I could have stayed there always, content with 
the simple rural things. There’s a pretty bend 
of the river that winds lazily through one 
end of the village and there’s a charmed spot that 
I often think about when I’m blue or restless. 
The Town Landing, the old folks still call it. 
You can go rowing when you like, past the weep¬ 
ing willows and the fields sprinkled with meadow 
flowers. There’s a peaceful Main Street where 



102 


THE TOWN LANDING 


you can hear a pin drop—not much like Tremont 
or Washington streets, Til say! And it’s cool on 
the hottest days of summer. Swinburne—do you 
know him?—has described the spot accurately, 
although I suppose he called it by some other 
name: 

'^Along these low pleached lanes on such a day. 

So soft a day as this, through shade and sun. 


And then he goes on to describe the ‘old wild 
road and the bees about the flowering thyme.’ 

Barbara flushed with ill-concealed pleasure. 
“I like some of his descriptions very much,” she 
said, “although-” 

He waited. 

“Although I think he is pagan,” she said, with 
a blush. 

Francis winced. There came to his mind the 
image of a tall young monk in ill-fitting robe, 
with angelic face uplifted and pure hands out¬ 
stretched toward a little Child. Barbara was a 
Catholic. Of course she was narrow and re¬ 
stricted in her views. 

But he asked calmly: “Which of his poems do 
you particularly like?” 

“Well, after the Hymn to Proserpine, I 
think I like Faustine best.” 





FRANCIS AND BARBARA 


103 


He smiled. She clearly appreciated what was 
good in poetry. He quoted in a full rich voice: 

**For in the time we know not of 
Did Fate begin 

Weaving the web of days that wove 
Your doom, Faustine/* 


“It’s a very realistic thing; perhaps morbid, 
don’t you think?” he asked. 

“Realistic, but not morbid,” she replied. “To 
me it represents the poisoned cup of pleasure, in 
striking contrast to the joys of an innocent life.” 
She colored again, for she was still shy with this 
young man whom she had met but once. 

Francis was agreeably surprised to discover 
that Barbara’s mind was far in advance of her 
years. That she loved and appreciated beauty. 
In anticipation he enjoyed many a pleasant hour 
with her beneath the old apple trees at the river’s 
edge. Already Francis knew that Barbara some¬ 
how belonged to him. He meant to cultivate her 
to his own taste, and then—who could tell? He 
smiled, for youth is impetuous and leaps over 
many obstacles when it is willing to recognize 
that there are obstacles. 

“I think that you are going to be very happy,” 
he said, smiling into the childlike face of the girl 
before him. “So now don’t worry any more. 


104 


THE TOWN LANDING 


And I know that you’re going to bring a flood of 
sunshine to a house where loneliness reigns. 
Now it’s settled. I’ll call—or rather you’re to 
call here to-morrow, at six. Meanwhile I’ll get 
in touch with Mrs. Forest, and day after to¬ 
morrow you’ll be deep in daisies and buttercups 
and drenched in honey and fresh milk.” 

“How can I ever thank you?” Barbara raised 
a rather pale little face to his. He thought that 
he could not ask for more adequate thanks than 
the look in those clear and trusting eyes. He 
meant to prove worthy of the confidence she so 
sweetly reposed in him. 

Left alone Francis threw himself into a great 
armchair by the fireplace in his study and sat 
musing for a long time. Strange to say, the 
image of his mother did not come to him to-night, 
but only that of this young girl. It was the first 
time that he had felt himself so singularly drawn 
toward any woman. 

His mother lay sleeping quietly in the little 
burying ground at Hillcrest. Barely a week 
had passed and already the face of an unknown 
girl had aroused him. It was not that Francis 
loved his dear departed less. But it was the call 
of youth in his heart for one of its kind. What 
principally attracted him in this girl he could not 
say—^whether it was the sensitive quiver of the 


FRANCIS AND BARBARA 


105 


lip as with downcast eyes she related her little 
story, or the somewhat nervous motions of 
her beautiful and shapely hands. It was perhaps 
those hands which especially attracted Francis. 
For they spoke more eloquently than words; 
they were singularly expressive. When she had 
placed one of them in his, such a little shapely 
hand, such a warm, tender little hand, it had 
quite fitted into his strong palm. It seemed to 
belong there, and he missed it when she had 
drawn it away. 

Francis could picture Barbara’s delight, wan¬ 
dering about the quaint streets and lanes of the 
old-fashioned town where peace seemed to brood 
everywhere, where the old farmers rumbled away 
to town in the early mornings on market days 
with their luscious wares, where the many-hued 
garments of the scare-crows swayed in the fields 
menacing the too-audacious birds, threatening 
them with powerless arms, which shook in weird 
fashion in the summer breeze. Orchards, corn¬ 
fields, flowerbeds, quaint cottage rooms, old 
rambling fences—all would take on new grace 
and charm for Barbara. Barbara! Francis liked 
the name. 

He could picture her in gingham gown feed¬ 
ing the chicks or racing with Brutus down a 
dusty lane; hanging over the fence, her face 



106 


THE TOWN LANDING 


buried in honeysuckle; looking into the pasture- 
land where the two favorite Jerseys browsed and 
chewed the tender grass; seated on a low stool 
beside the window with her sewing in her lap, 
the delicate agile fingers flying to and fro with 
the busy needle. A new and charmed life 
seemed to have dawned for the young man who 
but a Aveek before had been broken-hearted and 
desolate. 

He stretched out his slippered feet luxuri¬ 
ously to the blaze, for although it was June the 
night was somewhat damp and chilly. 

He had viewed the pleasant side of the pic¬ 
ture. On the reverse side—what? Barbara was 
a Catholic. This was a disadvantage. It made 
him regret that there was a barrier between his 
thoughts and utter sympathy Avith his little 
patient. 

He recalled his visit to the old Franciscan 
Church. Franciscan! For the first time he real¬ 
ized that his oAvn name Avas identical with that of 
the Poor Man who had traveled up and down the 
Avorld in a Avorn and mean habit, despising the 
conventions of the rich and calling on all things 
to love God and forsake aught else. He frowned. 
Francis—Francis of Assisi! 

He remembered LongfelloAv’s description of ^ 
the gentle maiden, Evangeline, passing doAAm the 



FRANCIS AND BARBARA 


107 


street of Grand Pre after Confession, with the 
light of God upon her. For Evangeline it was 
all right, perhaps. For a poem it may have 
been all right—rather picturesque in fact. But 
for Barbara it was another matter. He won¬ 
dered if all Catholics went to Confession, and 
hoped that she did not. He believed that he 
could easily teach her his philosophy of life—the 
love of beauty and the perfect freedom to wor¬ 
ship in whatever form beauty appealed. 

He wondered what his mother would think of 
the girl—his mother who lay in the little Cath¬ 
olic cemetery of Hillcrest in the shadow of the 
cross, away from her ancestors, her parents, 
those who had loved her most, while the village 
gossips sat in the prim little parlors and drank 
tea and discussed the strange event which had 
brought her to adopt tliis strange and hated re¬ 
ligion on her bed of death. 

He bit his lip. The potion was very difficult 
to swallow. It had created a sensation in the 
narrow little town. Everyone was talking about 
it. The popular verdict seemed to be that this 
sweet lady, as a result of the sad automobile acci¬ 
dent, in which she had struck her head, had be¬ 
come deranged before her death which occurred 
barely an hour afterward. Otherwise what rea¬ 
son could there be for her extraordinary act? But 


108 


THE TOWN LANDING 


there was one who did not talk in Hillcrest—that 
is, to anyone but God. The young priest who had 
had the happiness of receiving this belated sheep 
into the fold went about the streets silently, and 
received with perfect indifference the hostile 
glances cast upon him from all quarters. 

Francis rose and paced up and down the room* 
He sometimes thought that he would have his 
mother’s remains removed and placed in the 
Protestant burying ground of Hillcrest. It 
could be done. For he felt singularly out of 
place standing beside her grave in the Catholic 
cemetery. “Jesus, Mary, Joseph, I give you my 
heart and my soul!” “My Jesus, mercy!” These 
and other ejaculations inscribed on the ancient 
tombstones made him shiver. 

But the priest had said, “It was her wish.” 
Well, then, he would leave the thing as it was. 
He could not alter the strange decree of fate. 

Barbara was a Catholic! Some day perhaps 
he would tell her the story of his mother’s death. 
She might be able to offer some solution of the 
mystery. Who could tell? 


XI 


DAVID DREAMS OF A LITTLE 

PRINCESS 

‘‘T^AVIDr 

1 3 The widow Forest paused to dry her 
hands on her checkered apron and beck¬ 
oned to a young farmer who was weeding a row 
of vegetables in the adjoining lot. Her voice 
was shrill but not unpleasing. 

The young man straightened himself, waved 
his hand in response to the summons, and came 
striding over to the fence, which was thickly cov¬ 
ered with sweetbriar. He removed his hat, some¬ 
what ragged as to brim, exposing a shock of 
auburn hair, curly and thick, well brushed back 
from a manly forehead. David’s blue eyes had 
a few fine lines about the corners, induced by 
constant exposure to sun and wind. His sturdy 
brown arms were bare to the elbow. 

“David,” said the little lady, “I’m so flus¬ 
tered that I hardly know where to turn. Of 
course she’s welcome to come, the poor dear, and 
if she can be content with plain fare and simple 

109 


110 


THE TOWN LANDING 


ways, I can remove the old blue bedspread and 
bring down that little white cot that’s up attic. 
Oh, ITl fix that part of it all right. But I de¬ 
clare to you, David, that it fairly took my breath 
away with the suddenness of it. My own dear 
Francis says it’s the thing for her, and that set¬ 
tles it.” 

David waited patiently, hoping for a speedy 
solution of the problem that had proved so agi¬ 
tating to the little old lady. 

“When the doctor ’phoned, you can believe I 
was excited. There was the gingerbread in the 
oven, and I just knew it was burning to a crisp. 
But what could I do?” 

“You couldn’t do a thing,” said David, sooth¬ 
ingly. He was eager to hear more about this 
mysterious “she” who was apparently coming to 
Hillcrest and to the little cottage. 

“No more could I. And just at that identical 
moment, if the grocer’s boy didn’t come thump¬ 
ing on the door and—” 

“And you knew he would eat half of the 
strawberries out of the basket in the interim,” 
suggested David, smiling roguishly. “But you 
had to listen to the message which was—was—” 

“Yes, yes! How fussed I am, to be sure! 
Where was I? Oh, yes, at the back door and 
the grocer’s boy—” 




DAVID DREAMS OF A LITTLE PRINCESS 111 


David leaned forward on the fence and sighed 
despairingly. Then he resigned himself to in¬ 
evitable fate. 

“You remember how I always said I’d never 
have that telephone put in,” continued Mrs. For¬ 
est. “And how, when I finally did resign my¬ 
self, it gave me the fidgets every time I heard 
the bell. It was so—so startling to hear a voice 
from nowhere, you see, David. It almost made 
me feel that the end of the world might be com¬ 
ing, and that’s all there was to it. And ever 
since—but to return to Francis. He said she 
was coming, and he’s going to bring her to¬ 
morrow.” 

“Who is she. Auntie?” asked David. He 
thought that she must be a very modern young 
woman, judging from his estimate of Francis, 
whom he knew by appearance and from hearsay. 

“I’m sure I- Oh, David, do see those hens 

in the tomatoes!” 

“Auntie, who is she?” David was determined. 

“Well, she’s a Miss East. Or was it South? 
I declare I quite forget. But I know ’twasn’t 
North. There, I have it. Of course—^West! 
For I instantly thought of the grape trellis so’s 
to fix it in my mind. David, do you s’pose you 
could get some white enamel and fix that bed¬ 
stead up a mite?” 





112 


THE TOWN LANDING 


“I shouldn’t wonder,” David replied, heartily. 
He was satisfied that he had the whole story. 
A city girl coming to the country for some wild 
roses! David was thrilled. Life was a bit hum¬ 
drum at times in this remote corner of the 
world. It was apt to be so for the young farm 
hand in the fields as well as for the physician in 
the city streets. Life was sometimes a bit lonely, 
too. 

David disappeared into the shed behind the 
house. When he reappeared he carried a paint 
brush and sundry jars, and his face was flushed 
with pleasant anticipation. 

All the rest of the evening he labored pains¬ 
takingly over the bed. It was for the Princess 
—so he termed the city girl—the Little Princess, 
the Little Queen. David felt intuitively that 
this was more than an ordinary girl, or Dr. Som¬ 
ers would hardly have taken such an unusual 
interest in her. 

David had never spoken to Francis. He alone 
of all the townspeople argued hotly when un¬ 
kind words were said in regard to Mrs. Somers’ 
deathbed conversion. David understood per¬ 
haps as well as the priest, for he was deeply 
religious by nature. He understood that the 
sweet lady had come at last into her rightful 
heritage. And whenever he chanced to visit the 


DAVID DREAMS OF A LITTLE PRINCESS 113 


little cemetery he invariably paused to Imeel on 
a newmade mound. He was the only one in 
the village who remembered to pay his devoted 
tribute. David could do for the departed what 
her own darling child was unable to do. He 
could murmur a fervent De Profundis for the 
repose of her soul, or a decade of the beads, the 
latter a devotion dear to the heart of the man, 
who was singularly childlike in his piety. 

That evening when his work on the farm was 
done and the painting was successfully accom¬ 
plished, David took his best friend, a short corn¬ 
cob, and sat on the doorstep. David was all¬ 
round man of work on a beautiful estate adjoin¬ 
ing the Forest cottage. Just now his people 
were traveling in Europe, and he was alone for 
the summer. 

David was a dreamer as well as a man of ac¬ 
tion. There was time in his schedule for indul¬ 
gence in both. To-night his dreams were some¬ 
what confused and fragmentary. As the lazy 
spiral drifts of white smoke ascended into the 
blue ether his thoughts drifted out in pursuit of 
them. 

And in the white clouds he saw: A Little 
Princess dressed in white, with hair of gold 
like the heart of a daisy and dress like the daisy’s 
shield. Saw her as plainly as if she were present 


114 


THE TOWN LANDING 


before him, and wondered whether her coming 
would make any difference in his life. David 
did not know that it was to make a great, very 
great difference. 

There, a little way before him on the grass, 
was her little white bedstead, trimmed here and 
there with a knob of gold by David’s painstak¬ 
ing hand. Its whiteness seemed to suggest 
something of the soul of her who was coming 
to take possession of the cottage and of the 
hearts of two simple people, who had for a long 
time wished for something to brighten the dull 
routine of evervdav existence. 

The Angelus sounded from a little tower at 
the crest of the hill. David knelt on the step, 
while he recited in low voice the old, old Prayer 
that a great artist once took as his favorite theme. 

“The Angel of the Lord declared unto Mary 
♦ • • 

Across the yard came the strains of an old- 
fashioned hymn. Auntie Forest was giving out 
airs from the well-thumbed hymnbook, as was 
her nightly custom. “Throw Out the Lifeline,” 
and “Abide With Me,” faithfully followed by 
“Rocked in the Cradle of the Deep.” 

David finished his devotions and sat down 
again to dream. A few birds skimmed slowly 
across the sky. The chicken yard was empty. 


DAVID DREAMS OF A LITTLE PRINCESS 115 


He could see the rows of feathered heads snug- 
glmg against the mother hens in their cozy little 
apartments. Brutus, Francis’s last bequest to 
Mrs. Forest, lay a few feet away dozing on the 
earth, with one eye open. Everything on the 
farm was slumbering. The wheezy airs of the 
old melodeon came more subdued in the mellow 
distance. 

David finished his pipe and ascended to his 
apartment in the great barn, a snug room over¬ 
head with everything at hand that he loved best. 
Cozy and venerable chairs, a homey bedstead 
with crazy patchwork quilt, books, and a nice 
little table, all looking out toward the river. 
Over the bed was a large crucifix. Not of deli¬ 
cate gold or silver or ivory composition, but rude 
wood with a realistic plaster figure of Christ, 
all the vast Wounds gaping wide. The head, 
slightly drooping and turned to one side, seemed 
to be seeking a place for its rest. 

Sometimes, gazing intently on these great 
gaping Wounds which some crude but under¬ 
standing hand had fashioned without great deli¬ 
cacy or taste, David saw the pleasant picture 
of this still valley vanish from the eyes of his 
soul. Something from these deep Wounds 
called to him, telling of a peace far beyond and 
above that which he had experienced in happiest 


116 


THE TOWN LANDING 


moods—of a peace that was beyond compare 
with the quiet beauty of a summer evening when 
blue melted into gold, and gold into crimson and 
purple, and purple to gray, beauty that was in¬ 
finitely more than the splendid plumage of the 
peacock that strutted on the side lawn vainly con¬ 
scious of its wonderful gifts. 

David sometimes stretched out his strong 
brown arms as if he would hold this fleeting 
vision. But alas, inevitably it eluded him and 
fled away. 

What of the peace it promised? He could 
not tell. Not the priesthood. For David, kneel¬ 
ing in St. Theodore’s on quiet Sunday mornings 
and watching every movement of the vested fig¬ 
ure on the altar, knew that he would never aspire 
to such dizzy heights if he could. It was not 
this that called him. What? 

David was an intelligent Catholic, a consistent 
Catholic, who lived as if every day were Sunday 
and as if, like Blessed Peter Faber, in reality he 
saw his Guardian Angel in human guise at his 
side. True, he was only a hired man. But what 
of that? To David the dignity of labor was a 
sacred thing. He never found tasks too trifling 
or despised them because they were such. So, 
dragging water for the cows, leading them home 
from the pasture, grubbing in the potato patch, 


DAVID DREAMS OF A LITTLE PRINCESS 117 


driving away from the strawberries the maraud¬ 
ing birds, sweeping out the stables—all these 
things were accepted and performed in the rev¬ 
erent spirit of an understanding heart. All these 
things were part of God’s beautiful creation. 
And David loved the soft, warm, mysterious 
earth, where myriad forms, undreamed of save 
in His omniscient Mind, came to birth, flour¬ 
ished and crept through the yielding soil to reach 
the light. Oh, the wonders of creation! David 
understood the rapture which Father Frederick 
Faber, the gentle Oratorian, felt when he de¬ 
scribed these marvelous gifts of the good God. 

Sometimes, leaning on his hoe or spade, David 
would lift his eyes to the low purple chain of 
hills that fringed the pleasant valley, and con¬ 
verse with his Maker somewhat after the manner 
of the Psalmist of old. His heart was thirsty 
for the Supreme Beauty; his soul cried out for 
God. 

‘‘O God, my God! To thee do I thirst at the 
break of day! For thee my soul hath thirsted, 
for thee my flesh, oh, how many ways! In a 
desert land, and where there is no way and no 
water.” 

So now, David, feverish to be near his heart’s 
(desire, brushed his hair carefully, put on his best 
suit, and bounding over the stairs two at a time. 


113 


THE TOWN LANDING 


swung lightly down the village street in the di¬ 
rection of St. Theodore’s. 

It was quiet and dim within the chapel. A 
faint flicker from the altar lamp described wide 
circles on the floor. The image of Mary Im¬ 
maculate threw out motherly arms and bent its 
head as if to incline to the requests of those 
who loved her. 

David slipped into his own place, a rear bench, 
having first gently raised the window at his side 
in order to permit the little whisperings of Na¬ 
ture to penetrate the loving ear of Christ. 

He drew out from his pocket his beads, rough, 
brown, wooden beads, strung with Mary’s medal 
and ending in the little crucifix that was par¬ 
tially worn away in the years by the impress 
of a strong man’s lips. David knew how to 
meditate, although he had never learned from 
books. One by one he passed and repassed those 
scenes so well loved, in which the principal actors 
were Mother and Son. 

Jesus and Mary! David’s loneliness and pain 
fell away at the feet of the two he loved so well. 
To-night Mary’s motherly eyes seemed to pierce 
him through. It was as if she said, ‘T am the 
Princess, the Queen—your Princess and Queen. 
You belong to me and to my Son. You are 
wholly Ours.” 


DAVID DREAMS OF A LITTLE PRINCESS 119 


It was strange. What could she mean? Da¬ 
vid was puzzled. He listened in his soul, but 
there came no other word. 

He whispered hoarsely through the darkness: 
‘‘Blessed Lady, you are my mother, and that 
is even more than Queen. You know that I 
have no vocation to high things. I am too old 
now. I am twenty-nine—or I shall be so the last 
of your month, October. And, Blessed Lady,’’ 
David’s lips were very dry now, “you know I 
am only a hired man. I am fit for nothing 
more.” 

But she said nothing to that. 

David sighed. The silver beeches seemed to 
reecho the plaint, for they quivered outside the 
window, and the little flowers bent toward one 
another as if confiding their secret beliefs. On 
the opposite side of the chapel the blue and pur¬ 
ple mountains leaned near with almost human 
sympathy. 

Night after night David had come here for 
the last visit, to ask the same relentless, restless, 
unanswered question. Ajid night after night he 
went back home along the lonely moonlit road 
no wiser than before. 

To his heart he whispered: “It’s a puzzle. I 
can’t make it out.” And to God he said: “Thy 
will be done.” 


120 


THE TOWN LANDING 


As David bent to genuflect he cast a loving, 
lingering glance toward the Queen who would 
not deign to answer her hired servant. And he 
thought that he discerned a gleam in the eye of 
the Mother who could not resist her child. 


XII 


GINGERBREAD AT HILLCREST 

B arbara could hardly believe that she 
was seated beside Francis Somers in his 
splendid car and was rapidly whirling 
away to the little town of Hillcrest. 

The car rolled along easily. The girl, totally 
unaccustomed to such luxury, leaned back on 
the cushions, then straightened herself uncon¬ 
sciously after the manner of those who have 
never been accustomed to ease, and whom the 
contact with luxury frightens a bit at first. She 
felt a little shy of the slight, silent man beside 
her. Francis was looking straight ahead down 
the road, for they had not as yet left the city 
behind and the numerous obstacles they encoun¬ 
tered on the way made driving somewhat pre¬ 
carious. 

The blocks, tenements and roof trees looked 
somehow very different from the beautiful car. 
Barbara thrilled as she realized that she was 
leaving them all behind, and with them memories 
which had at times been loved. 


121 


122 


THE TOWN LANDING 


Francis said: ‘‘You will like the country. It’s 
an ideal time to get your first glimpse of Hill- 
crest.” 

The country, the weather, are unfailing topics 
of conversation when people are not too well 
acquainted with one another. They serve to 
bridge over many an awkward situation. It is 
only in the later stages of friendship that one 
never thinks of alluding to a topic so ordinar3^ 
Just now to hear Dr. Somers speak in even so 
ordinary a manner seemed comforting to Bar¬ 
bara and quite enough to satisfy her lonely heart. 

“I like the country very much,” she said in 
a low sweet voice. 

Francis liked Barbara’s voice. He was glad 
that he had thought of this plan for her. To en¬ 
joy a thing of beauty, something which pleased 
him, he would go far and endure much. 

Barbara was good to look at, so he told him¬ 
self. It was pleasant to watch that sensitive 
small face and to listen to her voice, and there 
seemed to be a fragrance which emanated from 
her whole dainty being. It spoke to Francis not 
of the heavy scents of perfume which are foimd 
in hothouses, but rather of the frail wild blos¬ 
soms which grow in country hedges in the 
springtime. 

“Somehow I never feel lonely in the country,” 


GINGERBREAD AT HILLCREST 


123 


she said. ‘‘The growing things are so near to 
me, and I seem to understand them and they to 
understand me. It is not always so with— 
people.” She smiled, just the faintest smile that 
curved her lips into a perfect bow. 

Francis almost took the corner of a hedge as 
he watched this sensitive sweet mouth and de¬ 
cided that his protegee was a very nice little 
girl. He was proud of his discrimination. 

“That’s jolly,” he replied. “Well, I doubt if 
there is a prettier spot in the State than Hill- 
crest. Of course, the natives hardly appreciate 
it. Most people don’t see beauty when it’s right 
with them. That’s human nature, I suppose. 
What we get easily is not appreciated half so 
much as that which we must go far to obtain.” 

Barbara brightened perceptibly. It pleased 
her to think that she and her kind benefactor had 
some feelings in common. 

They swept past a little burying ground with 
old crazy stones leaning to one side and sparrows 
twittering a Requiem above the mould of the 
graves. 

Francis said quietly: “I have just buried my 
mother.” Barbara glanced toward him just in 
time to see an expression of keenest anguish 
sweep over his fine face. 

The girl possessed all a woman’s gift of sym- 


124 


THE TOWNi LANDING 


pathy. Just now it seemed to draw her nearer to 
the young physician to learn that he was in 
trouble, a real trouble, for one’s mother was al¬ 
most a part of one’s own self. 

She drew a bit nearer to him unconsciously, 
and peered in childlike manner into his face. 

“Oh, I’m so sorry!” she said. “I’m sure I 
understand. I lost my dear mother when I was 
a little girl at school. It’s something no one can 
understand save those who-” 

She broke off, for the old sad memories were 
strong in her soul. And she saw a little old rock¬ 
ing chair, a simple trundle bed with patchwork 
quilt, a sweet grass sewing-basket and a pair of 
spectacles lying useless on the sill of a little 
cottage room looking out to low-lying hills. Not 
much to remember, some people might think. 
But to Barbara it represented a world of pain 
and loss. 

Francis drove still more slowly as if to prolong 
this intimate conversation while they were alone. 
The tall tops of the trees hung quivering do^vn 
as if to listen to the words. He was silent, for 
his grief was new, while hers was old, very old. 

So Barbara, thinking to comfort him, said 
sweetly: “But she is not—^lost, you know. You 
will see her again.” 

He turned almost fiercely. “That is the 



GINGERBREAD AT HILLCREST 


125 


trouble/’ he said in a hoarse strained voice. “I 
shall not see her again.” 

The girl felt suddenly cold and chill. She 
shrank back into the car. A little pain smote 
her heart. She understood that the young man 
beside her, so fortunate in the things of earth, in 
position, talents, fortune and many other things, 
was destitute and stripped of the only treasures 
that count. 

“I am the Resurrection and the Life!” The 
solemn words came to Barbara as she had often 
read them in her Missal. Above how many 
tombs were they written, over how many altars 
did the echoes linger, when the funeral cortege 
had passed through the doors on its final journey 
to the grave I 

. . and I will raise him up on the last day.” 
That very morning at Holy Communion Barbara 
had fed her starving little soul with the Bread of 
the Strong, the Bread of Children, and she 
understood the Promise in all its wealth of grace. 

Francis, seeing that he had hurt her, changed 
the subject abruptly. 

‘‘See the scarecrow in yonder field,” he said, 
and laughed pleasantly. The bad moment had 
passed. 

Barbara looked, and saw a grotesque figure 
dressed in a coat not unlike the proverbial coat 


126 


THE TOWN LANDING 


of Jacob, nodding and holding out ungainly 
arms toward the highway. An old stovepipe hat 
adorned the head of this old dandy, with buff- 
colored trousers much the worse for wear, and 
a blue coat ornamented with brass buttons. A 
deceptive figure, for while he appeared to 
threaten he was in reality most harmless. 

Barbara forced a smile, but she was very un¬ 
happy since a moment ago. She wished that she 
had not made the unfortunate remark about the 
dead. 

But she tried to be merry, and replied: “Do 
you have many thieves about here? Birds, I 
mean.” 

“Wait and see.” He laughed again. He was 
extremely handsome when he laughed that way, 
so the girl thought. Amusement or pleasure 
lighted up a face somewhat stern in repose. She 
suddenly felt that this young man had a strong 
will and a rigid determination, that he might be 
very difficult to move if he once made up his 
mind. 

Why should this opinion have disquieted 
Barbara? She sighed again, remembering with 
a pang of fear what a good old priest had once 
said to her; “The more beautiful danger ap¬ 
pears, the more dangerous it is.” 

Not that one could possibly connect evil with 


GINGERBREAD AT HILLCREST 


127 


this young man who had been so kind to her. 
But, but- 

Her thought broke off abruptly and came 
straight back to the quiet country road and the 
sweet-smelling shrubs by the wayside. 

“You know what Cowper says?'^ asked 
Francis. “ ‘God made the country and man 
made the town.’ I think he was right. What 
do you think?” 

They turned up the little main street of Hill- 
crest. Barbara espied with a little throb of 
excitement the cross on the front of a modest 
little frame church standing just at the turn. 
She stole a gance toward her companion and 
noted that as he came upon the church his face 
grew suddenly stern, and that he bit his under 
lip angrily. Barbara did not know about his 
lady mother. She could not understand why the 
sight of the church antagonized him. She at¬ 
tributed the look to a dislike of the church for its 
own sake. 

But she soon forgot the church in her delight 
at the scene which now spread out before her 
wondering eyes. They drove down a side street 
marked by a signpost. “Meadow Lane.” And 
underneath, in smaller letters, it said, “To the 
Town Landing.’’ 

“.Oh, what an interesting name!” Barbara 



128 


THE TOWN LANDING 


cried in delight. ‘‘Town Landing! What does 
it mean, Doctor?” 

“It’s a charming spot at the end of the Lane,” 
he replied, “where in earlier times there used to 
be a sort of pier and the townspeople kept their 
boats and went fishing. There used to be splen¬ 
did trout in the river. And it was an ‘old swim- 
min’ hole,’ too. You recall James Whitcomb 
Riley’s poem? Many a good time we had there 
when I was a boy.” 

They rolled between fields of clover almost as 
deep as the car itself, until they came to a neat 
white cottage with a fence, very tiny, almost like 
a doll’s house, set in the pleasant fields well back 
from the road. Fence, cottage and garden paths 
were all in perfect order. 

Francis stopped the car and jumped lightly 
to the ground. 

“Home at last!” he said gaily while he assisted 
Barbara to alight. 

Her heart fluttered fast at this moment. She 
followed close behind him up the prim little walk 
bordered with orange and yellow nasturtiums. 
She noted that the hydrangea shrubs were in 
luxurious leaf and promised a rich store of blos¬ 
soms by and by. She heard the chirping of 
meadow frogs near by and fancied that she 
caught the hoot of an owl. 


GINGERBREAD AT HILLCREST 


129 


Oh, it was wonderful in God’s own country! 

Francis lifted the shining brass knocker repre¬ 
senting a lion’s head. The sound reverberated 
through the quiet of the evening. What a peace¬ 
ful spot! One could almost fancy that the least 
sound might travel for miles. 

There was a quick movement within the doll’s 
house, and a moment after the door was opened 
by a sweet, prim little old lady, quaint and grace¬ 
ful, done up tightly in a lavender cashmere gown 
of a fashion long gone by. There was a fussy 
bit of old lace at her throat, and Barbara saw 
that although her cheeks were somewhat thin 
there was just the faintest flush of pink upon 
them. 

She dropped a little old-fashioned curtsy to 
Barbara and shook Francis warmly by the hand. 

“Land alive! It does my heart good to see 
you, boy! And here’s the dear child you’ve 
brought! Well, well! If she can be contented 
here, I’m sure she will be very welcome. It quite 

delights my old withered heart to- There, 

don’t shake your head, Francis, for you know it’s 
so! I’m not so young as I used to be, and that’s 
the truth with no mincing of words. Although 
when I was young they said I was not ill looking. 
Well, well! It seems as if ’twas only yesterday 
when your poor dear ma-Well, well! Go 




130 


THE TOWN LANDING 


right into the parlor while I make a cup of 
tea.” 

Francis made a droll face at Barbara like a 
naughty schoolboy; he was beginning to enjoy 
the situation immensely. Barbara, too, had bright¬ 
ened from the moment that the cottage door 
opened, revealing this dear delightful old-world 
mistress who was not unlike the character in a 
story book. 

Barbara returned Francis’ look with interest, 
whereupon they both laughed heartily. 

The girl entered the little best room, all fussed 
up with cosy pillows of all imaginable designs 
worked in embroideries, with quaint worked 
mottoes in frames, and with antimacassars on the 
backs and the arms of the chairs. There were 
waxed flowers in glass domes and stuffed birds 
on the mantels, and impossible balls of tissue 
paper hanging from the most miexpected places. 
All in all it was part of the story book, and quite 
carried out the idea of the doll’s house. Barbara 
was half suffocated with pleasure. 

The old ladv bustled back in a few moments 
followed by a slip of a colored child with starched 
gingham stiffly erect on her slim body and creak¬ 
ing at every step she made, and with slim pig¬ 
tails tightly braided and tied with various bits 
of colored string. 


GINGERBREAD AT HILLCREST 


131 


They carried a tray between them, placed it 
on a real old gate-legged mahogany table, and 
handed around the most delicious cups and 
saucers of real Nippon. Oh, how Barbara’s eyes 
sparkled! Francis, watching her narrowly, 
grew more and more content with his project. 
He thought that his little protegee was really 
very pretty when her face lit up with animation. 

“Well, well, it does my heart good,” said the 
little old lady settling herself primly on the very 
edge of a frail chair of gilt with impossibly 
slender legs. It was a real doll’s chair, thought 
Barbara, and made up her mind that she should 
never venture to sit on it for fear of crushing it 
to pieces. The little lady was so frail, so diminu¬ 
tive that she seemed almost ethereal. The chair 
suited her and she suited the chair. 

Barbara with her own dainty hands helped 
Francis to a cup of delicious Orange Pekoe tea, 
and a piece of Mrs. Forest’s extra-brand ginger¬ 
bread with chocolate frosting on the top. 
Francis laughed as he recalled pleasant mem¬ 
ories of days not long passed. “Do you re¬ 
member, Auntie, how I used to eat the frosting 
off and leave the cake, once upon a time?” 

“Do I remember? Dear heart!” The old 
lady sighed a little gentle sigh, then brightened 
again. “Yes, I remember, Francis, as if it were 


132 


THE TOWN LANDING 


yesterday. And you used to say that my cup 
custards and apple sauce were the best ever.” 

“I’ll say they are yet if they’re anything like 
the gingerbread. Auntie, you won’t mind giv¬ 
ing me another piece, by the way? It’s—it’s 
luscious. Nothing like it at the Adams House, 
or the Touraine either, for that matter. What’s 
the use? We haven’t progressed. We’ve gone 
backward when we’ve let salads and sundaes and 
what not take the place of the old apple ‘dowdy’ 

'—’member. Auntie, with the crust an inch deep, 
and built up in a huge earthen dish? Sometimes 
nowadays when I’m lunching at the Parker 
House or at the Elks’ I let myself imagine that 
I’m about to sit down to an old-time famous 
jamboree in your back garden, with the chickens 
coming up to snatch at the crumbs, and Topsy 
here a baby—excuse me, Gracie—shooing them 
away with her checkered apron. Remember how 
Pauline Metz was a little girl and her mother 
brought her to visit, and how mad I got when 
she asked for fingerbowls?” Francis threw back 
his head and indulged in a hearty laugh. 

“I suppose you and Pauline are engaged, 
aren’t you? Come now, it’s about time!” The 
little old lady peered almost jealously into 
Francis’s face. 

He colored and looked away. “No,” he said 




GINGERBREAD AT HILLCREST 


133 


shortly. “We are not engaged. We fight like 
—I was going to say like cats and dogs. We 
don’t seem to agree on anything. Pauline has 
peculiar tendencies. I sometimes wonder where 
she’ll end.” 

Barbara was more deeply interested in this 
conversation than she cared to show. She re¬ 
called the lovely image of Miss Metz, through 
whose kindly thought she had come to this haven 
of rest. But for Pauline she would never have 
encountered Francis. Pauline had spoken of 
her liking for the Catholic Church. Was that 
what Francis meant when he said that she had 
peculiar tendencies? Except for that, was 
Francis interested in Pauline? From the con¬ 
versation she judged that they had been friends 
from childhood. Pauline was a society girl. 
Francis would probably appeal to her type, and 
she had referred to her mother’s liking for the 
young physician whose future was so glowing. 

Barbara felt suddenly small and insignificant. 
She even felt a bit miserable. Angry at herself 
for the inexplicable feeling, she forced herself to 
remember that she was but a poor and untrained 
girl, and that this young man had treated her 
with kind charity, no more. 

Barbara could not help feeling amusement 
when she saw the aristocratic Dr. Somers taking 


134 


THE TOWN LANDING 


huge bites out of the homely gingerbread, which 
was undeniably good. He was almost a boy 
again for the moment. Barbara’s lonely little 
heart could not help warming to him in spite of 
Pauline and what she represented. 


XIII 


THE DOLL^S HOUSE 


A S I was saying to David,” Mrs. Forest 
J \ continued volubly, “the bedstead was 
just the thing, only the posts were a trifle 
tarnished. But then I thought of a pot of gilt 
that I had kept in the stable for just such a pur¬ 
pose, and David fixed it up in a twinkling. 
Leave it to David. We’ve put it in Malcolm’s 
room. At first I thought I couldn’t bear to have 
anyone sleep there, but I got over that silly feel¬ 
ing. Like as not ’twill never seem so lonely as 
when it was unoccupied. And it’s the pleasant¬ 
est room upstairs, although a bit warm at this 
season.” 

“I think I told you that Auntie had lost her 
only son in the war,” Francis explained in an 
aside to the girl. 

“Oh!” Barbara’s big sympathetic eyes filled 
with sudden tears. But she said no more, re¬ 
membering Francis’ ideas regarding death. 

They drank their tea and ate their ginger¬ 
bread in silence after that, for the old lady enter- 

135 


136 


THE TOWN LANDING 


tained them without effort on their part. She 
was bright and cheery in spite of her great loss 
and seemed to lighten by her presence the quaint 
little room. 

At last Francis rose reluctantly to depart. 

‘T wish that I could stay longer,” he said re¬ 
gretfully. “It’s so restful here!” He looked 
straight at Barbara as he spoke, unconsciously 
looked at her, and she colored. 

“I’m glad you find it so,” said Mrs. Forest. 
“You know, most folks when they get to the city 
lose all taste for the simple things, which are 
best after all. As I was saying to David—it was 
the morning that the hens strayed into the cur¬ 
rant bushes and I got the letter from- As 

I was saying,” she rambled on, “I went to the 
cemetery that afternoon and it rained a few 
drops on my best bonnet. A few little drops of 
rain or a few little drops of distrust or unhappi¬ 
ness will ruin anything. Strange, isn’t it? As I 

was saying to David- Oh, dear me, what 

was I going to tell you? It was either about the 
joys of living in the country or ’twas something 
else. Have you ever met David Lester, Francis? 
You know he takes care of the Jones place next 
door. They’re abroad, going over the battle¬ 
fields just now.” She paused to wipe away a 
silent tear. “Maybe they’ll pass my boy’s grave. 





THE DOLL’S HOUSE 


137 


But there is no mark to tell just where it is. I 
somehow like to think they'll pass by it." 

“No, I’ve never met David," said Francis 
dryly. He did not feel particularly interested in 
the Jones’ hired man. 

“Well, David’s a beautiful soul for all he’s a 
Romanist," said the old lady. She was utterly 
unconscious of the break. Barbara flushed, but 
said nothing, knowing no offense was intended. 
Francis bit his lip in characteristic fashion and 
let the unhappy remark slip. Then Auntie 
Forest, realizing all of a sudden that Francis’s 
lady mother had died in the Catholic faith and 
that she slept in the little St. Theodore’s burying 
ground, said, to make a bad matter worse, “Oh, 
forgive me, Francis. I forgot your poor dear 
Ma. I’m a garrulous old woman that ought to 
know how to hold her tongue!" 

Barbara felt suddenly interested in the hired 
man, David Lester. She somehow felt that she 
was to have an ally in David. David, too, was a 
Catholic, and if the old lady liked him, spoke so 
highly of his character, he was worthy to be a 
friend. David, David. She liked the name, too. 

The young slip of moon was swinging idly in 
the summer sky when Francis stood on the door¬ 
step of the cottage with the breath of roses all 
about him and said good-night. He found it 


138 


THE TOWN LANDING 


hard to go. Something in the velvet darkness 
called to him, something from the quiet fields, 
from the motionless bells of the flowers, from the 
far dim sky, from the leaning white stones of 
God’s Acre, from the flowing bosom of the river 
behind the farm. And—something called to him 
from the little dolFs cottage, in the door of which 
stood a prim and sweet little lady all fussed up 
in cashmere and lace and smelling of old laven¬ 
der and rose. 

Behind her and half a head above her, the dark 
curls shaded the forehead of a young slim girl in 
a plain white muslin gown which fell in graceful 
folds about her slender anldes. The young moon 
played with her curls and over the white brow. 
Francis said good-night to them both, smiling. 

Then he walked quickly down the garden 
path. The flowers all seemed jumbled together 
in a great blotch of fading color. The tips of 
the ancient beech trees were silver in the light of 
the stars twinkling down the garden path like 
fireflies. 

He looked back and waved his hand once from 
the car. His last glimpse of the doll’s cottage 
revealed a still, small white face, like a doll’s face 
looking after him down the shadowy road. 

Then the cottage door closed. 


XIV 


CURING THE PHYSICIAN 

THINK that I’m getting very fond of 

I that little girl,” Francis said to his friend, 
George Barrows, as the two men sat over 
a quiet pipe in the Doctor’s office. 

The summer was passing swiftly. The young 
physician had paid weekly visits to see his little 
patient at Hillcrest, and had watched her prog¬ 
ress along the road to health and happiness. 
Perhaps, if anything, she was getting along too 
well, for once or twice she had spoken of her am¬ 
bition to return to work. Francis had decided 
that she must remain indefinitely with the widow. 
Why? 

Of late the old quaint town where he had been 
born and had spent the happy hours of a care¬ 
free boyhood, had assumed an altogether un¬ 
dreamed-of importance to him. True, here were 
enshrined the memories of his devoted mother, 
and all that remained of her was resting lightly 
beneath the sod of Hillcrest. .Warmed by the 

139 


140 


THE TOWN LANDING 


golden sun and sung to by the sweet-voiced birds, 
in the peace of Christ she slept. Wild vagrant 
flowers crept over her fair head, and children 
came sometimes to toddle with unskilled feet 
over the little couch of her repose. It was alto¬ 
gether a fitting place for her who had longed for 
rest and had never found it save in the shadow of 
the Cross. 

Francis dutifully visited her grave. Strange 
and unfamiliar and unloved was the ground 
which he trod when, turning in at the gate, a 
wanderer, he found himself among those with 
whom he could not sympathize. The tall Cross 
in the middle of the little enclosure flung out 
friendly imploring arms to him who feared it, 
and would shun it if he might. Its shadow had 
fallen darkly on his heart. 

George, in the dim light, could barely discern 
Francis’s face as he spoke of the “little girl” of 
whom he was growing “very fond.” Say, rather, 
whom he loved with all the ardor of a being born 
for love, for the bright and beautiful things of 
life, and who, when he once desired, could not 
bear to be thwarted of his prize. For in the short 
space of two months Francis had discovered that 
he desired, that he needed and must have, his 
little patient all for himself. He must show her 
the way to love, and divert her mind from those 


CURING THE PHYSICIAN 


141 


odd, sometimes morbid fancies, as he termed 
them, which startled and angered him at times. 

“Do you think she knows it?’’ George asked. 

“No, I’m sure that she doesn’t. Of course she 
must one of these days. I fancy that she cares 
for me, although she’s obstinate at times. We 
have quarreled about—well, about religion and 
that sort of thing. But Barbara has a great deal 
to learn, and I fancy that I am a fairly compe¬ 
tent teacher.” 

George was interested, albeit troubled. He 
listened with the utmost attention to every word 
of this startling disclosure. 

He said of a sudden: “What of Miss Metz? 
Folks used to think—say-” 

Francis turned irritably. “Folks make me 
tired!” he replied shortly. “They know more 
about my business than I do, it seems. There 
was never any sentiment between Pauline and 
me. And there’s less of late.” 

George waited patiently. Francis continued. 
“There’s decidedly less of late. Pauline has sur¬ 
prised the world by avowing that she’s under in¬ 
struction and intends to enter the Catholic 
Church. Of course you’ll forgive me when I 
say that she always was obstinate.” 

George smiled. “Well,” he replied, choosing 
his words carefully, “you’ve got to be obstinate 




142 


THE TOWN LANDING 


when you set out to win a big prize. Miss Metz 
could hardly expect to obtain it without some 
strenuous effort, some sacrifice such as, for in¬ 
stance, forfeiting the good opinion of a fascinat¬ 
ing young man like you.” 

Francis was pleased at the implied compli¬ 
ment. 

“Barbara’s being a Catholic shouldn’t stand be¬ 
tween us,” he said in a burst of confidence. 

“Why, that depends.” 

“Depends! How?” asked Francis angrily. 

“On the girl, I mean. Of course if she’s a real 
true Catholic, it will stand between you, believe 
me! If she were not, why, in that case it 
wouldn’t matter much so far as your success is 
concerned.” 

“I wouldn’t want my wife to be bound to any¬ 
thing that I disapproved of,” Francis said. “Of 
course, if you’re born in the Church and love it 
and all that, why, you can’t see my side.” 

“Oh!” George smiled sardonically. “Oh! 
And what about being born out of it and not be¬ 
ing able to see the other side?” 

“Hum! Oh, what’s the use of argument? If 
she loves me she’ll give in.” 

“Don’t be too sure of it, old man,” counseled 
George. “If she gives in. I’ll say she’s not 
worthy of you and far from worthy of her 


CUEING THE PHYSICIAN 


US 


Church. I wish you luck—if your luck is on the 
right side.’’ 

Poor old George! With his daily Mass and 
his Communions and his Visits to churches on 
week days when there was—^mystery of mys¬ 
teries!—nobody there, how could he understand 
that love was a religion all by itself and as such 
transcended all other? Francis pitied George, 
whose life, he fancied, must be rather monoton¬ 
ous. George didn’t smoke, and when he did he 
confessed that it made him sick. He didn’t go 
around socially, for he confessed himself happier 
with his “Vita Nuova”and his visionary Beatrice. 
The Blessed Virgin, Francis supposed she was. 
Odd old chap, George. 

“Now, just to-day,” Dr. Somers went on, 
“something happened that made me dislike the 
Church even more. We had a case at the hos¬ 
pital, and I was to operate. There was no time 
to be lost, for the disease was making headway 
every instant. The jDatient was a young man of, 
say, twenty-five. We got him ready and were 
about to administer the anaesthetic when, lo and 
behold, he sat bolt upright and refused to allow 
any further proceedings until someone should 
send for a priest. Why he hadn’t decided on that 
matter before I’m sure nobody could tell. 

“As it happened, the chaplain was away from 



144 


THE TOWN LANDING 


home. It might take fifteen minutes or more for 
a priest to arrive, and every second counted in 
this case. The poison was working through the 
system. We argued, but to no use. The obsti¬ 
nate chap was resolved to have the priest and 
die! Well, the priest came, a young man like 
myself, and everyone had to clear out of the 
room. It was some moments before the job was 
done, whatever it was. The patient-” 

“Got well?” George asked, hopeful that the 
Viaticum had effected a miracle in this event. 

“Got well! He died, of course. Of course. 
But he seemed satisfied to die after that, so we 
couldn’t disappoint him. To me it was a case of 
clear suicide, for those fifteen minutes killed him, 
I maintain. Nine chances out of ten, had we 
performed the operation immediately, he would 
have lived. I call it a tomfool act. He could 
have gone through with that performance with 
the priest afterward.” 

“But let us suppose there would be no after¬ 
wards,” suggested George. “What then?” 

“Well, then he’d die, I suppose. But I don’t 
believe it would have made much difference any¬ 
how.” 

“That chap probably obtained the peculiar 
grace of what we term a deathbed repentance, 
Francis,” George said. “And he didn’t dare re- 



CURING THE PHYSICIAN 


145 


fuse it. Thank God he didn’t! Maybe he had 
been devout to the Blessed Virgin during his 
careless life, and she saw to it that he died right. 
It was a close call, though. I’ll say.” 

Francis thought of the little medal at that 
moment lying in his pocket. He wondered what 
George would say if he knew it was there. Poor 
funny old George! How many women would 
give much to say they had received a compliment 
from his lips! How many vainly sought to 
attract his admiration! And they were worsted 
because of—Beatrice. The Blessed Virgin, in 
other words. An ideal Lady who, possibly, did 
not exist. Francis was almost amused at his 
friend’s perfect unworldliness in this very 
worldly twentieth century. 

‘T don’t doubt but that after having received 
the sacraments the poor chap—the lucky chap, I 
should say—was ready to die, was quite resigned 
to it; that if he could have had his choice between 
a reckless life such as that he had been living, and ' 
this newborn peace with God, he would have 
chosen peace—and death.” 

Dr. Somers looked up quickly, while a puzzled 
expression came over his countenance. 

Peace and death! He remembered his 
mother with a recollection that was fraught with 
anguish. He whispered to his heart: “My 




146 


THE TOWN LANDING 


mother! With your great, your burning love, 
where are you? For you seem more distant from 
me because of the mystery which surrounded 
your deathbed, which shut me out from perfect 
understanding with you. I hardly dare to think 
that I shall ever see you again. I do not know 
what I believe except—that all things are a con¬ 
tradiction and an abyss of desolation.” 

“The Catholic conception of death is very con¬ 
soling, very beautiful,” George was saying. He 
drew from his pocket a small, flat, leather-bound 
copy of the Daily Missal. Turning to the Mass 
for the Faithful Departed, he read in Latin: 

“Brethren, behold I speak a mystery to you. 
We shall all rise again, but we shall not all be 
changed. For death is absorbed in victory. 
Where is thy victory, O Death? Where is thy 
sting?” 

“Do you laiow the Dies Irae?” George asked. 
And upon the confession of Francis’ ignorance 
of this beautiful and touching prayer, George 
recited a few stanzas for him: 

Think, 0 Jesus, for what reason 

Thou enduredst earth^s spite and treason; 

2^or me lose in that dread season. 

Seeking me, thy worn feet hasted. 

On the cross thy soul death tasted; 

Let not all these toils be wasted. 


CURING THE PHYSICIAN 


147 


Francis, lover of beauty, was won by the sin¬ 
gular pathos of the lines. The ringing of the 
office bell brought to an end the sober conversa¬ 
tion of the two friends. 

When they parted at the door they spoke the 
commonplaces that men usually speak. But in 
Francis’ soul rang a pleading cry that would not 
be silenced: 

“Let not all these toils be wasted!” 

After the patient had departed, he took his hat 
and strolled out into the soft summer night. 

Far away the moon sailed amid the baby 
clouds that hung like cherubs about the halo of 
an old saint. How wonderful the heavens were 
to-night! Francis lifted his hat once, for he was 
not wholly pagan, and murmured: “Quam ad- 
mirabile. ...” 

He walked rapidly down Green Street, past 
the West End Branch of the Public Library 
where a group of bookworms bent over their 
newspapers and magazines. He stumbled over 
numerous small urchins on the sidewalk and 
came finally to the door of old St. Joseph’s 
Church. 

It was Saturday night and nearly nine o’clock. 
He hoped that the church would not be locked. 

It was not locked. 

Francis entered and descended the steps into 


148 


THE TOWN LANDING 


the basement. The interior was somewhat dim, 
but up at the altar and the shrines a few tapers 
were burning. He sank into one of the rear 
benches in a corner and, as once before, in the old 
Franciscan Church in the North End, waited. 

The altar was wrapped about in peace. On 
the altar cover was a single word, embroidered in 
gold thread; Jesus. 

Suddenly Francis discovered a familiar figure, 
a face that he knew. Yes, there was no mistak¬ 
ing the young monk near the altar, holding 
the lovely Child, who this time was robed in a 
tunic of Our Lady’s own blue. His arms were 
outstretched to caress the divine Boy; his pure 
and lovely eyes gazed straight into the heavenly 
Countenance. It was the same young monk. 
There could be no mistake. 

What his name was, where he had lived, and 
how long ago, Francis did not know. Suddenly 
he wished that he did know. 

Then he became aware that he was not alone 
in the old church. For up near the altar, at 
either side, solitary dark figures were silhouetted 
against the figures of the confessionals. Now 
and then a slight clicking sound, as of a slide 
moving softly, caught Francis’ ear. 

He looked attentively in the direction whence 
issued the sound and saw that a figure emerged 


CURING THE PHYSICIAN 


149 


from one of the shadowy recesses and advanced 
to the sanctuary rail. Another figure proceeded 
into the confessional, taking the place of the first. 

The person at the railing was an aged man. 
He bowed in reverent adoration or supplication 
for some minutes, then walked, or rather limped, 
down the center aisle and past the bench where 
Francis sat in the shadow of a post. In his hand 
was a tin luncheon box such as night watchmen 
or laborers carry to their work. His garments 
were neat and clean, although they had seen long 
service and here and there were patched. The 
old man was not particularly refined, but as he 
walked down the aisle in the light of the electric 
lamps there was a certain quiet dignity stamped 
upon his furrowed face. Whatever was his story, 
whatever his hopes, his joys or sorrows, he had 
very evidently found strength and peace back 
there behind the curtain of the confessional— 
much-maligned institution, which those without 
the true fold took such infinite pains to dis¬ 
parage without knowing whereof they spoke. 
Truly, it would seem to one watching like Dr. 
Somers in the basement of the old church to¬ 
night, that those who really practiced going to 
Confession got something out of it after all! 
And if so, what business had the rest of the world 
to find fault? 


150 


THE TOWN LANDING 


So twenty minutes passed. Men and women 
and young children went quietly in and out, 
some of them carrying grotesque bundles, their 
Saturday night’s shopping. They went rever¬ 
ently about the tremendous business which had 
brought them here. Uniformly they made their 
brief preparation, disappeared into the confes¬ 
sionals, where they remained for a longer or 
shorter time as the case might be, came forth with 
shining faces, and went up to the altar, where 
they knelt beneath a flickering red lamp and 
prayed. These faithful souls represented the 
leper who, being made clean, returned to give 
thanks to God. 

For the most part the penitents were common, 
ordinary everyday people, who had many bur¬ 
dens to bear in these days of stress, because of 
the high cost of living and the materialism that 
raged about them on every side. But with might 
and main they were striving to hold fast that 
which they had, the precious heritage of a price¬ 
less Faith. 

One salient fact impressed itself especially on 
the mind of the lone watcher in the rear of the 
church. It was the solidity of the doctrine, the 
uniformity of the practice which these people 
carried out. Here all the worshipers went about 
their sacred duty without appearing to take note 


CURING THE PHYSICIAN 


151 


of one another, in the same quiet, dignified way. 
There was no hesitation, no interchange of salu¬ 
tations, no appearance of haste. All was evi¬ 
dently done in comformity to a law which they 
thoroughly understood and which bound all in 
the selfsame way. 

A priest came forth from one of the confes¬ 
sionals. He walked slowly up and down the 
church a few times. By now the last penitent 
had departed, and he waited lest some belated 
soul might need his help before the church was 
closed for the night. The priest was a young 
man with a fine, noble face, which, now in the 
strong light, looked rather fatigued and worn. 

It had just dawned on Francis’ mind that it 
was a warm evening to be closed up in a narrow 
and uncomfortable space, listening to worrisome 
tales of trouble, of distress and of sin—when he 
found that a kind voice was saying close to him: 

‘T beg your pardon. Would you like to go 
to Confession before the priests leave?” He 
fancied that Francis was a troubled soul who had 
strayed into the church trying to find strength 
and peace. Perchance he had been a long time 
away from the Sacraments and had by a miracle 
of grace strayed into God’s house to-night. 

“No, thank you.” Francis rose awkwardly. 

The priest was a trifle disappointed. He 


152 


THE TOWN LANDING 


feared resistance to God’s grace was working in 
this soul. He said in a gentle tone, “You do not 
belong to this parish?” 

“No, Father. I’m not a Catholic.” 

“Oh, please pardon me. I’m sorry if I in¬ 
truded. But you see, sometimes persons come 
in late like this and the priest goes away before 
they have time to make their Confession. I 
thought that you might have. ...” 

The priest accompanied Francis to the vesti¬ 
bule. He stood in the doorway for a moment, 
hoping that this young man might speak. 

Francis said: “I realize that I was intruding. 
But I wasn’t exactly spying on you.” The 
priest smiled. “While I do not like the Catholic 
Church—you will pardon my frankness—it in¬ 
terests me strangely. You see. Father, I lost 
someone dear to me a short while ago. Before 
she died she was received into the Catholic 
Church. When I arrived at her bedside she was 
gone. So I never understood just why—but I’ve 
wondered why—she did that. It seems to me 
that there must have been some influence at 
work. For my mother was a Methodist. It 
was my father’s church, and, so far as I have any, 
it was mine. In life my mother never, to my 
knowledge, entered a Catholic Church.” 

“Your mother must have known a great deal 



CURING THE PHYSICIAN 


153 


about the Church,” the priest said quietly. ‘‘She 
must have thought about it a very great deal. 
There is a strong probability that she had been 
fighting grace for a long time. And when sud¬ 
denly death faced her, she knew there was no 
time to be lost. It is not an uncommon thing in 
the history of conversions.” 

Then, with a winning smile, the priest con¬ 
tinued: “The Catholic Church, you see, as 

Oliver Wendell Holmes once said, ‘is a verv 
good Church in which to live, but the best in 
which to die.’ It and it alone offers to the soul 
in the last extremities the strength and consola¬ 
tion which are sorely needed at that hour. I 
should be pleased to talk further with you about 
—your mother, if you care to call, at any time.” 

Francis thanked the kind young priest and 
found himself a moment later walking along the 
street. 

“I wonder what George would say if he could 
have seen me a few moments ago!” he said to 
himself. 


XV 


A BREATH OF INCENSE 

A ND then,” said Francis, drinking in 
eagerly the details of Barbara’s sweet 
childlike face, ‘‘what did you do?” 

“Why,” she answered slowly, settling herself 
more comfortably in the depths of a big arm¬ 
chair, “why, I thought that I had read the note 
wrong at first. You see, I had been looldng for 
work for so long, and I had suffered so much! I 
never dreamed that life could be so hard or that 
I could be so tired of it. For a moment I felt 
almost as if I were dying and that everything 
was vanishing about me. The whole world was 
spinning around and around like a big top. I 
did not know where to turn. I dreaded to go 
back to the place where I boarded and face that 
little attic room. For how was I to get the 
wherewithal to live? You see, things look very 
black when you’ve tried your best and failed. 
Even the faintest ray of hope is something. But 
things looked very black just then. And now 
see how happy I am! God has been very good 

154 


A BREATH OF INCENSE 


155 


to me/’ She flushed as she spoke the last sen¬ 
tence, reverently. 

Francis replied seriously: '^‘Yes, you’re cer¬ 
tainly happy now, if I am to judge by appear¬ 
ances. You’ve improved wonderfully, little girl. 
Life is strange. I’ll say. I’ve often wondered if 
bleak hopeless days come to everyone. I im¬ 
agine that they do. But to see certain people, 
you’d never say they had anything to suffer in 
their whole lives. And yet they must suffer; it’s 
the inexorable law.” 

“No one can escape,” said Barbara pensively. 
“But at the time of our own trial our miserable 
small sorrows seem the most stupendous thing, 
the most tragic in all the world, and it is terribly 
hard to see beyond them. Tell me, did you ever 
read the Imitation?” 

“I can’t say that I’ve read it,” Francis replied. 
He knew that Thomas a Kempis was an old 
Catholic monk, and as such he fancied him to be 
a dreamer, a visionary. 

“There are wonderful things for our consola¬ 
tion in that book, which is a world classic,” 
Barbara said sweetly. “I’ve often thought that 
if there were but one book in the whole wide 
world, and that book were the Imitation, we 
would And all the philosophy necessary and good 
for us. For it tells us how to be happy in the 


156 


THE TOWN LANDING 


midst of the cares and trials of this world, and 
how to find peace in pain/’ 

“I don’t think perfect peace can be found,” 
said Francis, who was brooding since Barbara 
had mentioned the little book. “Now, for in¬ 
stance, look at the amount of physical pain men 
have to undergo. The ending of life’s journey 
is infinitely worse than the beginning or the 
middle. What is more painful than to watch 
the slow decay of the body, the gradual disinte¬ 
gration of its mechanism, the dissolution of its 
parts? I can never understand why we must 
suffer. I could never see that it is a blessing to 

mankind, as some of your-” he was about to 

say “old monks and what not believed and 
taught”—“as some people would have us believe. 
To begin with, one starts out in life helpless. It 
is some years before one really lives, so to speak. 
And then, just as life is beginning to open out 
as a wonderful gift and just when the body is 
at the zenith of its powers and the intellect its 
own master, one begins to fall apart! 

“Teeth, hair, limbs begin to fail us. There 
are pains and aches which are but the beginning 
of what is to come. We feel that we are com¬ 
mencing to lose power. Memory forsakes us, 
and so on. It’s a pitiful spectacle, and I confess 
it’s beyond me if this is calculated to make men 



A BREATH OF INCENSE 


157 


content and happy. In fact IVe sometimes 
wondered if life is really worth while.’’ 

Barbara’s earnest little face was lifted eagerly 
to the face of the man before her. A little 
prayer to the Holy Spirit of Truth and of Light 
rose to her lips. 

In the depths of the big armchair she was 
curled up like a soft little flower in its pod, so it 
seemed to Dr. Somers. She had never looked 
quite so lovely to his admiring eyes as now. 

She was wishing that she might show him the 
true meaning of this earthly life and the philoso¬ 
phy of eternity. She said, “Of course it is hard 
to suffer and die. It is hard to see those whom 
we love go from us. But not so hard, is it, when 
we consider that this life is not all? Thomas a 
Kempis speaks very beautifully and truly of 
this: ‘Should not all things hard and difficult be 
borne for eternal life?’ The reward will be so 
much greater as there are labors and pains to be 
undergone. The saints tell us so, and even Our 
Lord Himself. Of course, it is very hard to 
suffer. But one need not suffer alone.” 

Francis thought, “What an extraordinary 
girl! At an age when others like her are think¬ 
ing of dress, of the theater, of marriage, she is 
thinking of Eternal Life! I wonder if there are 
many girls like her in the world! I doubt it.” 


158 


THE TOWN LANDING 


“But you were telling me about the day when 
you found the note of dismissal in your pay en¬ 
velope,” he said. “Was it easy to face the world, 
the future, even with your faith and trust?” 

“Not easy. No. It was very hard.” Barbara 
spoke in very low tones of her old sorrow. 
“But surely there would be no merit in it; it 
would not be a cross, if it were easy to bear. But 
now I understand how all these trials were for 
my good, and how God rewards trust in Him.” 

“Tell me,” he said, for he was weary of hear¬ 
ing about spiritual things, “are you quite con¬ 
tented here?” 

“Yes. I have been very happy. Lately I 
have obtained a little embroidery to do, although 
Mrs. Forest scolds about it all the time. She 
says that my companionship is quite enough to 
repay her for her kindness. But I know that I 
am not much company for anyone. I don’t 
know very much. I can only fill a little obscure 
niche, and even then but poorly.” 

“That’s nonsense,” said Francis crossly. 
“You do a great deal of good in the world by 

just-” He was about to say “by just being 

so very pretty to look at,” when he stopped— 
“by just being cheerful and contented. You 
know we need people who are happy, in the 
everyday world, where there are so many imag- 



A BREATH OF INCENSE 


159 


inary troubles that Mrs. Grundy herself would 
be amply satiated.” 

“I know that Mrs. Forest was pained,” Bar¬ 
bara smiled mischievously, “when she discovered 
that I am a Catholic. She said ‘Oh dear me!’ in 
such a sorry tone that I burst out laughing.” 

Francis listened attentively, for the subject 
of. Barbara’s religion interested him very much. 

“I—she has to bear a great deal with me,” she 
went on. “The first time she saw my little 
Crucifix on the wall I thought that she was going 
to faint. She said: ‘Oh, my dear! I’m sure, if 
it is any comfort to you to have it there. I’ll not 
bother you in any way. But it’s the first time to 
my knowledge that an object of the sort has ever 
entered this house, where four generations were 
Methodist ministers. It—excuse me—it quite 
took my breath away.’ ” 

“What did you say?” Francis made an odd 
grimace, remembering the Crucifix that had 
rested in his dead mother’s hands, as if it had al¬ 
ways belonged there. 

“I offered to remove it and to cherish it 
privately if she found it so distasteful. For after 
all it is her house and her wall. And I can love 
my little Crucifix wherever it is. But she was a 
perfect lady. She said, ‘Oh, dear, no! Not for 
thewwld! This is a free country, my dear! Our 



160 


THE TOWN LANDING 


forefathers came here to obtain the right to wor¬ 
ship as they saw fit. We must be consis¬ 
tent.’ ” 

‘T thought that I heard you singing a hymn 
one night, Auntie,” I said. ‘Simply to Thy Cross 
I Cling.’ ” 

“ ‘Why, yes, so you did,’ she said. Tt’s a fav¬ 
orite with me, and number two in the hymn book. 
But as for having a cross on the wall, I never 
thought of it. I suppose I have been incon¬ 
sistent.’ 

“So it ended,” concluded Barbara, “by the 
Crucifix remaining there on the wall. It hasn’t 
hurt anything so far as I can see.” She rather 
enjoyed tantalizing Francis for the moment. 
The return to better health had enlivened Bar¬ 
bara’s spirits. 

“I went to the city one day,” she said shyly 
after a brief silence. 

“Indeed? And why did you go that sti¬ 
fling atmosphere when you are getting on so 
nicely? I thought that I told you not to go near 
the city for awhile, at least until the cool 
weather.” 

Barbara thought that he could be very un¬ 
reasonable when he was so disposed. And being 
very much of a woman, she could retaliate. 

“I wanted to see the familiar places, the places 


A BREATH OF INCENSE 


161 


where I had spent some happy months of my 
life,” she replied. 

“And where did you go?” he asked without a 
smile. 

“I”—how cross he looked!—“I went past the 
place where I used to live on Newton Street. I 
went around by the rear so that I could look up 
to the little window where I worked and 
dreamed. It gave me much pleasure to go 
back.” 

He laughed a bit scornfully. He was angry 
with her for disobeying his directions. “You 
surely didn’t expect to find things greatly 
changed in a couple of months?” 

“I don’t know.” 

Francis could not read a woman’s sensitive 
heart. He did not know that this girl’s was a 
deep, quiet nature, capable of intense joy and of 
intense suffering. He wounded her, not mean¬ 
ing to. 

“And where else did you go?” A vague jeal¬ 
ous fear smote him. He knew that she would 
tell the whole truth, and he waited. 

“Why—why, I went to church. Nearby. It 
was nice to steal into the quiet chapel and to see 
again the holy things that I loved so much.” 

“But you could go to St. Theodore’s,” said 
Francis with a scowl. “It’s all the same, isn’t it?” 


162 


THE TOWN LANDING 


‘‘Yes and no. It’s the same, and yet, you see, 
it’s not quite the same. I used to go to the 
Church of the Immaculate Conception, and the 
altar, the shrines, everything, were especially dear 
to me. You see, when you have got used to 
carrying all your little joys and sorrows to one 
little spot and laying them before the feet of One 
who understands, why it’s a sort of trysting 
place between you and Him.” 

“And—him?” 

“Our Lord, I mean.” 

“Oh!” He was singularly relieved. “Well, 
I’m sorry that you didn’t obey my instructions. 
Patients of mine usually do. Otherwise I’m not 
responsible for the outcome. You are not too 
strong, and I don’t approve of you poking 
around old musty buildings where nobody knows 
how many germs are waiting to be caught up.” 

“I’m not afraid of germs,” Barbara said stub¬ 
bornly. 

They did not seem to get on well together that 
evening. Francis questioned the girl no further, 
for he saw that it was useless. But something 
told him that she had gone to Confession in the 
old church. This fact seemed to remove her just 
a trifle farther from him, and made him more 
wretched. 

Happily, Barbara remembered that music 


A BREATH OF INCENSE 


163 


possessed charms to soothe savage breasts. She 
took her place at the little melodeon and sang 
from memory the air “Absent.” 

eyes grow dim with tenderness the while. 
Thinking I see thee, thinking I see thee smile.** 

A tear glistened in Francis’ eye. The song 
had the effect of making him more unhappy. 
For once his visit to Hillcrest seemed to be a 
failure. 

The sweet birdlike voice sang on until it died 
away, sinking to a low whisper on the last word. 
In the kitchen the little mistress of the house 
wept silently into her checkered apron, recalling 
one who in the bright flush of perfect manhood 
had gone bravely away to the sound of fife and 
drums, to return no more, but to find his rest in 
a far-off field where poppies grow. 

The young physician, sitting stiffly in the old 
horsehair-covered chair, was wondering dully 
what was the matter with the afternoon. From 
the window he caught up the sweet rare scent of 
new-mown hay. Away down at the end of the 
widow’s lot a tall stalwart figure was merrily 
swinging a scythe. Francis wondered if it was 
David Lester,—David who. Auntie Forest had 
said, was a “beautiful soul.” David was a 
Catholic. He wondered if Barbara had held 


164 


THE TOWN LANDING 


many conversations with him, and if so what was 
the nature of them. 

Francis drove away in the deepening dusk, 
disconsolate. Passing by the open door of St. 
Theodore’s little chapel, he suddenly stopped the 
car and jumped out. He could not seem to pass 
a Catholic church of late without going in. 

Why? 

He had not entered the chapel since the morn¬ 
ing of his mother’s Requiem. Now, in the soft 
twilight, it was very appealing. The red lamp 
swung before the tabernacle. There was no 
other light. Francis dropped into the last bench 
and again waited. 

And again nothing happened. 

There was no faint suggestion of the busy 
workaday world in this hallowed retreat. It was 
distinctively God’s house and the Gate of 
Heaven. Francis saw the plain little gold door 
on the altar and vaguely wondered What was 
behind it. He caught the scent of old-fashioned 
garden flowers and the breath of incense. 

Strange to say, although there was no other 
worshiper in the quiet solitude, he suddenly knew 
that he was not alone. 

Somebody else was there! 

Who? 


XVI 


THE OLD BUZZ WAGON 


D avid LESTER, cutting the tall mea¬ 
dow grass, paused to dry the moisture 
from his face and to look away toward 
the sweet-scented stacks of hay piled up against 
the horizon. 

From the adjoining cottage, he saw a little 
figure coming toward him, clad in a pink-and- 
white gingham dress and swinging a large gar¬ 
den hat by the strings. 

David felt something strange and sweet tug 
at his heartstrings. Barbara was very winsome, 
and he was by no means unresponsive to dainty 
things. 

He had watched Barbara closely since her ad¬ 
vent to the cottage. He had grown to look for 
her coming through the orchard or garden, and 
to feel a trifle disappointed when she did not ap¬ 
pear. Once or twice he had dropped into the 
cottage on errands, and on such occasions he had 
the satisfaction of hearing the loquacious old 

165 


166 


THE TOWN LANDING 


lady discourse of the girl whom she had grown to 
love in so short a time. 

David had spoken on numerous occasions to 
Barbara, and their conversation had been ex¬ 
tremely natural. He felt that he had always 
known her, that he had been waiting for her 
to come to Hillcrest. Why? He did not 
know. 

David could not help wondering about the 
visits of the young physician; he was certainly 
very much interested in Barbara. It was not 
surprising on the whole, and David thought that 
Dr. Somers showed very good taste. 

He determined to overcome his propensity to 
shyness and to be more at ease with the girl who 
was disposed to be so friendly. 

So when she drew near, he took off his ragged- 
brimmed hat and smiled. Barbara thought that 
he was very handsome when his face lighted up 
that way. 

He said: “Good afternoon. I trust that you 
are enjoying yourself at Hillcrest, Miss Bar¬ 
bara.” 

It was commonplace enough, and yet David 
was anything but commonplace. Big and awk¬ 
ward he might be, but ordinary he certainly was 
not. In fact the girl keenly felt that “here was 
a man.” He was much more generously propor- 


THE OLD BUZZ WAGON 


167 


tioned than the aristocratic young physician. 
His face was more open and his smile more fre¬ 
quent. They were strangely dissimilar when 
the girl mentally compared them. 

‘‘Oh, I’m having such a beautiful time!” she 
replied. “I hate to think of ever going back.” 
And she continued, gazing frankly into his face,, 
so that he dropped his eyes: “Everyone here has 
been so kind to me!” 

David knew that she understood how much he 
wished to be useful to her. He knew that she 
appreciated the fresh-cut flowers that he 
gathered in the early morning for her place at 
the breakfast table, that she appreciated his 
handiwork on the little white iron bed, and other 
things. It was an understood thing that he was 
to provide for her little wants. 

“I think I understand,” he said quietly. 
“When things are going smoothly, or, in other 
words, when the sun is bright in the heavens and 
there are but a few bits of feathery cloud up 
there,” he pointed far up toward the radiant 
canopy of blue that hung over the quiet land¬ 
scape, “why, sometimes we begin to think the 
rain is not far off. We are more or less like the 
weather, don’t you think?” 

“Yes. Wasn’t it St. Ignatius who said that 
in security we ought to prepare for trouble, just 


168 


THE TOWN LANDING 


as an act of foresight if nothing else? The saints 
understood so well 

Barbara knew that David was deeply re¬ 
ligious, for she had heard Mrs. Forest often 
speak of his piety and strong Christian manhood 
in terms of the greatest respect. The girl had 
watched him from her little bedroom window, 
going along the lonely white country road every 
evening, with his clothes nicely brushed and a 
look of quiet contentment in the very set of his 
broad shoulders. David was wonderfully good 
to look at when, after the toil on the farm, he was 
all cleaned and brushed—and shined, as Auntie 
Forest said. 

David made Barbara think of a priest. For 
one thing he went to pay an evening visit 
whether it rained or was moonlight. She had 
grown accustomed to peering eagerly out from 
her little window until she saw the tall erect form 
emerge in the drowsy garden where the flowers 
slept, and turn down by the gate. 

She felt that David, in spite of his goodness, 
was a lonely soul—one of those who, because of 
the very beauty of their souls, must suffer frcm 
the crudeness of life, must suffer from the home¬ 
sickness of those who, living as pilgrims and 
wanderers in a far country, sigh unceasingly for 
their own, must suffer from other men and 


THE OLD BUZZ WAGON 


169 


women, from the frailty of this poor weak human 
body, which is at times so leaden a casket for the 
precious and delicate pearl of the soul. 

“St. Ignatius was right,” David replied. 
“Life’s a strange puzzle at times. Don’t you 
think so? No matter what station of life we may 
occupy or how successful we may be, whether 
loving friends surround us or whether we are 
alone, there are times when we seem apart from 
all, even from our own selves. I suppose it’s 
hardly wise to dwell on such thoughts, for they’re 
apt to make us sad. Life’s too short, and we can’t 
live it over again.” 

“It helps to think of spiritual things, doesn’t 
it?” Barbara asked. ‘Dh, David, if only the 
whole world had the consolation, the certainty 
which we have, it would be a far different world. 
I’ve often thought, when I was working in the 
city, that it was a vast, seething hive of restless, 
ambitious, discontented, irresponsible people. 
They seemed to be drifting without anchor. 
Oliver Wendell Holmes spoke of this very thing. 
‘To reach the port of heaven we must sail some¬ 
times with the wind and sometimes against it; 
but we must sail, and not drift nor lie at anchor.’ 
David, did you ever think you’d like to be a 
priest?” 

“Why”—he looked away while a pained ex- 


170 


THE TOWN LANDING 


pression crept into his fine eyes—“I—^well, you 
see, I never had the chance—for the things that 
are necessary, the education and all that. Now 
I’m too old, if I did have a chance. And I’m not 
sure that I’d ever dare to aspire so high. I’m 
not at all sure that I’d make a fervent priest— 
holy enough, I mean. I’d rather just be a hired 
man unless I could be a saint. Maybe that I’m 
all right as it is; only sometimes, as you say, 
there are feelings that come-” 

“David,” Barbara wondered at her temerity, 
“David, you mustn’t drift! You mustn’t! It 
would be dreadful, after all you have been given. 
You see, you are different from most people I 
have met. Something seems to tell me that 

you-” David raised his head with a quick 

characteristic movement and looked straight into 
her eyes. “You see, something seems to tell me 
that you—belong to God!” 

There was perfect stillness in the summer 
fields. The trees bent a little nearer to earth, so 
it seemed, and the dainty flowers stojDped shiver¬ 
ing in the light winds to listen to the beating of 
two very human hearts. There was'something 
distinctly supernatural in the atmosphere, as 
long ago in Paradise, when the Lord walked 
among His own. 

David drew the torn brim of his hat a little 





THE OLD BUZZ WAGON 


171 


over his eyes as if to shade them from the sun. 
His strong brown hands trembled a little, hands 
that were used to the hard, rude toil of the fields. 
But Barbara liked those strong well-shaped 
hands, that somehow reminded her of the old 
monks, who in past ages as now cultivated the 
vineyards, and taught men the singular beauty 
and dignity of toil. 

“That’s strange,” he said quietly. “For I’ve 
sometimes felt that way myself. But I’m what 
you see me, just a hired man. I couldn’t be 
anything else. I know how to plant potatoes 
and to prepare the soil, how to milk and all that. 
But that’s about all.” 

The girl felt that here was the avowal of a 
tremendous tragedy. It was but one more story 
of a soul that had been left behind in the mad 
eager rush of life. Out of its sphere, fitted for 
something higher, yearning for it, and nobody 
seemed to care. “God’s in His heaven, all’s 
right with the world,” but it was hard to realize it 
sometimes. 

“David, tell me—did you ever hear of St. 
Alphonsus Rodriguez?” Barbara asked sweetly. 
She cherished a tender devotion toward the 
saintly old Lay Brother of the Society of Jesus. 

“No, I don’t think I ever did.” 

Barbara spoke breathlessly. “He was a won- 


172 


THE TOWN LANDING 


derful character. He is very near and dear to 
me. He was a Spaniard by birth whom God 
marked early for His Own. When he was a 
very little child they used to find him hiding a 
picture of Our Lady in his breast. When he 
entered the Society of Jesus he was api)arently 
broken down, above the usual age, and seemed 
almost useless. But the Father who received 
him said that he really felt obliged to admit him 
as a saint. Oh, it was wonderful! He suffered 
terribly from constant temptations and interior 
trials. But he used also to enjoy such consola¬ 
tions in spite of all that sometimes he would be 
forced to cry out, ‘Enough, O Lord!’ like 
Xavier. 

“He was a porter at the Jesuit College for 
many years. His very appearance, as he went 
along so quietly and gravely to open or shut the 
door, impressed all. He used to say, every time 
he heard the bell ring, ‘I am coming. Lord!’ 
Would you like him, do you think, David?” 

“Yes. Very much. Strange that I never 
heard of him before! He seems to appeal to me, 
Miss Barbara, as you speak so sweetly of him. It 
seems as if he was more like myself in some ways. 
He was just a sort of hired man, wasn’t he? 
That is, God’s hired man?” 

“Yes, he was like you,” the girl replied. “I 


THE OLD BUZZ WAGON 


173 


remember something else about him. Sometimes 
when he heard the bell he would say, ‘Lord, I 
must open the door to thee, for love of thee!’ 
And then he went quickly and joyously to open 
it.” 

“That’s really beautiful,” David replied rev¬ 
erently. “Now I’ve sometimes talked to God, 
here in the fields. I’ve asked Him to protect and 
guard the baby seeds and to send the rain, and 
sometimes I’ve considered my own soul in com¬ 
parison with the hard, hot soil. And I’ve come 
to the conclusion that my life’s been mostly 
barren.” 

Barbara reproached him with a glance of her 
soft bright eyes. She was glad to find one to 
whom she could speak freely. She continued: 
“St. Alphonsus lived to be eighty-five years of 
age. Fifty-four of them were spent in the great 
work of perfecting his soul for Heaven. Those 
who recited the prayers at his deathbed said that 
he conducted himself just as if he were merely 
going to change his room. So he died. Oh, 
David, you’d appreciate his beautiful life! I’ve 
got the book, and I’d be pleased to lend it to you. 
Auntie Forest found it beneath my pillow one 
day and read a bit, I think. For she afterward 
said, ‘My dear, he seems to have been a rather 
nice sort of person. He reminds me of David.’ 


174 


THE TOWN LANDING 


I laughed. I couldn’t help it, although I think 
she was right,” Barbara said boldly. 

David changed the subject by saying, “How 
would you like to come for a little ride this after¬ 
noon? Of course,” his face drooped somewhat 
as he recalled Francis Somers’ beautiful car— 
“Of course. Miss Barbara, it’s only an old buzz 
wagon, but if you think that you wouldn’t mind 
—of course, there’s no very grand style here at 
Hillcrest.” 

“I’d just love it, David,” Barbara replied, 
clapping her hands. “I’ll tell Auntie. And I 
won’t forget about the book.” 

The girl felt strangely happy as she fairly flew 
back to the cottage and smoothed her hair and 
put on a simple white muslin gown in place of 
the checked gingham. She felt very much at 
ease with David since half an hour ago. 

She was serenely at peace as they drove along 
slowly over the rugged ground, where sometimes 
a mild inquisitive cow looked out in friendly 
fashion from behind a gray stone wall, and 
sometimes a brood of chickens would take to 
flight in a cloud of fine white dust. 

David was very clean and strong and hand¬ 
some as he sat beside Barbara at the wheel. His 
fine honest face was turned toward the distant 
horizon line, and his brown hand, with stalwart 


THE OLD BUZZ WAGON 


175 


muscles standing out, guided the old buzz wagon 
securely over its uneven bed. 

They passed old farm cottages settled peace¬ 
fully in the pleasant fields, and patches of green 
and yellow woods, and small rustic bridges flung 
across tiny brooks, and old boulders jutting out 
like sentinels in the lonely road. Ordinary 
things, one and all, such as one sees at every turn 
in the country. But to Barbara they were more 
beautiful because she enjoj^ed them with a kin¬ 
dred soul. It made her strangely happy to feel 
that she had unlocked the door of this great sober 
giant’s heart and found within a wide and clean- 
swept room waiting to be garnished. David had 
shyly confessed to her that he was sometimes 
lonely! 

She wove girlish fancies as she now and then 
stole a side glance into his face. There seemed 
to be no need of conversation just then. 

Life was strange! For here was a man of 
her own station in life, a fervent Christian, a 
gentleman, one who would tenderly cherish any¬ 
thing which he took for his own possession. 
Something had drawn them together from the 
uttermost ends of the earth, as it seemed. Why? 
For Barbara felt that what might be was not to 
be. Perhaps she might grow to care for David, 
and she thought that she might easily teach him 


176 


THE TOWN LANDING 


to care in return for her. Why not? It was the 
strange inexplicable mystery of life. She only 
knew it was not to be. 

The thought of Dr. Somers brought a little 
pang of fear and sorrow. She knew so well that 
he was obstinate, self-willed, somewhat con¬ 
ceited, that he was not a Catholic. And yet she 
could not drop the thought of him. In this way 
lay a hard path before her; perchance intense 
suffering. And yet life had her in its powerful 
grip. Time would tell. 

They turned in at the gate of the little God’s 
Acre, and David assisted her to dismount. They 
walked very near to each other up the quiet 
sunlit paths tended by gentle and loving hands. 

They passed the graves of little children who 
like the angels had flown quickly to God. Bar¬ 
bara vaguely wondered whether it were not 
better to have a fate like theirs—to be plucked 
securely by the Celestial Gardener before the 
waxen petals began to droop against the cold 
blasts of a wintry world. 

They passed the graves of the very aged, those 
who had tottered to heaven on feet made leaden 
by the length of the journey and the hardness of 
the road. They passed the graves of young 
mothers and maidens, of youths and of strong 
men. Barbara felt instinctively that she trod on 



THE OLD BUZZ WAGON 


177 


holy ground, and drew closer to the stalwart 
reverent figure at her side. 

They found the grave of Auntie Forest’s hus¬ 
band, who had been suddenly killed in a stone 
quarry, in the non-Catholic enclosure separated 
from the Catholic cemetery by a low iron fence. 
Barbara read thankfully: ‘T am the Resurrec¬ 
tion and the Life.” 

“But I shall not see her again.” The words 
came like a dark shadow stealing over the gentle 
heart of the girl. She recalled the solitary drive 
with Dr. Somers to Hillcrest and the memory of 
that unfortunate remark was fresh in her mind. 
He had missed the one thing necessary, the one 
beautiful, all-important thing, which this young 
stalwart hired man in the coarse tweed suit and 
straw hat that had weathered many summers, 
who stood beside her possessed! Life was 
strange. 

It was very sweet and peaceful in God’s Acre. 
The afternoon sunshine fell tenderly on the 
green moss creeping over the stones, hiding the 
names and inscriptions of many who slept. 

They walked on like two children. David had 
taken off his hat and bared his head to the cooling 
breeze. Barbara noted how tall and fine he was, 
how noble and manly. She unconsciously con¬ 
trasted him with another. She saw again the 


178 


THE TOWN LANDING 


slight shorter figure, the pale somewhat scornful 
face, the sensitive mouth and the laughing eyes 
that veiled interior shadows in their velvet 
depths. 

David’s bronze curls clustered over a high and 
splendid forehead. His mouth was firm and well 
shaped, but not obstinate. 

David was speaking of Mrs. Forest. Barbara 
aroused herself in time to catch the drift of his 
remarks. 

He was saying, “She ought to be a Catholic, 
for she has a wonderful faith, a wonderful heart. 
She just doesn’t understand the Church, that’s 
all.” 

Again a sad refrain awoke in Barbara’s soul. 
“He does not understand.” She did not refer to 
David. Would he ever understand? 

They placed a fragrant knot of garden flowers 
on the grave of Auntie Forest’s dead, then 
passed through the gate to the other side, where 
in the shadow of the cross those of the favored 
flock were sleeping. 

There was a grave near the main path newly 
sodded. “It’s his mother’s grave,” said David, 
and then bit his lip angrily because he had fal¬ 
tered in pronouncing Dr. Somers’ name. If he 
really cared for Barbara, David wished him well. 
He was not jealous, but he feared for the 


THE OLD BUZZ WAGON 


179 


outcome of what might prove to be a bitter 
struggle. 

Standing quietly by Barbara’s side as if he 
had always belonged there, David looked toward 
the distant highway, and with a sudden swelling 
of the heart saw a handsome car dashing along 
the white road in the direction of Meadow Lane. 


XVII 


DAYS AT THE OLD HOME 

** I ^ UT I care for her, Auntie,” Francis said, 
with something like a sob. He sat with 
the little old lady in the prim best room 
with its horsehair furnishings and its stuffed 
birds. Barbara and David were still in the ceme¬ 
tery, or perchance they had gone a little way 
along the quiet country road to enjoy the sweet¬ 
ness of the atmosphere. 

Mrs. Forest was quiet for a few moments. 
Then she said quietly: * “Well, Francis, I don’t 
know what to tell you. There’s only one thing— 
her religion.” 

He tossed his head impatiently. “Oh, that 
will be all right. She’s stubborn. If she really 

cares for me- You think that she does?” 

He waited eagerly for the answer. 

“I think—that she does. You know, there are 
ways of reading a woman’s heart—a young 
maiden’s heart—when one has grown as old as 
I am. It’s a deep, deep thing, Francis, the heart, 

and especially the heart of a woman. It is a 

180 




DAYS AT THE OLD HOME 


181 


strong and courageous thing, that has an al¬ 
most unlimited capacity for pain and suffering, 
especially if these be borne for someone whom it 
loves. But it is also a sensitive, delicate thing, an 
instrument whose strings, sweetly attuned, are 
easily brought into discord or even broken. And 
then there is little remedy for the damage. It 
is difficult to repair. Only a very clever and 
skillful workman can undo the damage. And 
then sometimes the old wound remains beneath 
the repair. Barbara is a fervent Catholic, my 
dear; while you-” 

She paused, and glanced keenly toward him. 

He colored and looked away. ‘T’m not a re¬ 
ligious man, you mean. But you know. Auntie, 
that I’m not a bad man. T^o one can ever say 
that I committed a gross error of any kind.” 

“You’re too proud; for one thing,” the old 
woman replied. “Pride, my dear boy, is your 
besetting sin. Don’t take it ill if I speak frankly 
to you. Barbara is a gentle, fragile flower, but 
beneath all her tenderness is a staunch will. I 
fear that you are going to be very unhappy be¬ 
fore you finish with her.” 

“Oh, I’m not afraid.” 

“That’s just the trouble. I could wish that 
you were afraid of a few things. We can’t be 
too sure of ourselves in this world. But come. 



182 


THE TOWN LANDING 


I’ll do what I shouldn’t—I’ll take you up to the 
dear child’s little room, and then you can better 
judge for yourself the interior life which she 
is leading. I declare to you it has quite altered 
my views. At first I used fairly to shudder every 
time she blessed herself at meals. It seemed 
grotesque and superstitious to me. But when 
Barbara explained it so sweetly, I thought better 
of it. For when one comes down to the fine point, 
why despise the cross on which the dear Saviour 
stretched out His arms and died for us? Many 
other things that I used to abhor in the Cath¬ 
olic religion I now see are really reasonable and 
quite simple if one looks at them from an un¬ 
biased view. Not that I shall ever for one mo¬ 
ment be anything but a good INIethodist. But I’ve 
come to the conclusion that to be good Christians 
we must all live according to the light of our in¬ 
dividual consciences. To revile and persecute 
those who do not believe as we do, but honestly 
and consistently follow some other line of 
thought, is very far from Christian, that’s all.” 

“You’re wonderful. Auntie,” the young man 
said as he followed her up the narrow and 
crooked stairs. 

“I’m only an ignorant old woman, so don’t 
call me wonderful,” she replied. “But I’m notv 
a pagan and I don’t intend to make others miser- 


DAYS AT THE OLD HOME 


183 


able because of my opinions if I can help it. 
Maybe that I’m all wrong about the Church, and 
tliat some day I shall wake up to find that I made 
a terrible mistake not to look into her doctrines 
in this life. Who loiows?” 

Francis stood reverently on the threshold of 
the tiny blue-and-white chamber with its simple 
white cot, its dainty muslin curtains and its air of 
peace and security. 

He looked curiously about. Over the bed was 
a very lifelike Crucifix of ivory. The Head, 
slightly inclined, was crowned with realistic 
thorns. About the Crucifix Barbara’s deft and lov¬ 
ing small fingers had woven honeysuckle blossoms, 
whose fragrance was wafted to the nostrils of the 
young man. The same dainty hands had made 
a soft little mat of fern leaves beneath the sacred 
Body where it rested on its hard bed. The 
Divine Martyr reposed on a cushion of flowers. 

Francis was touched, but not deeply. He 
thought that Barbara was an emotional little be¬ 
ing and capable of great depths of feeling. 

The figure on the Cross did not, however, repel 
him as had the same image which he had seen in 
his dead mother’s hands. The reproachful eyes 
seemed to yearn toward him as if the suffering 
Victim said: "‘What did I ever do to you that 
you should so dislike me?” 


184 


THE TOWN LANDING 


'T’m sure,” said the little old lady, interrupt¬ 
ing his meditations, “I don’t see anything out of 
the way in the flowers if she wishes to put them 
there. For, come to think of it, I’ve always put 
flowers on Malcolm’s picture in the sitting-room 
on Decoration Day and Christmas and on his 
birthday. And I never thought ’twas supersti¬ 
tious to reverence every bit of the picture, frame 
and all.” 

“Why, no,” said Francis reluctantly, “I don’t 
suppose ’tis, when you come to look at it that 
way. It can’t do any harm to anyone.” 

Beneath a small blue-and-white statue of the 
Blessed Virgin on Barbara’s bureau was a 
framed card. Francis was curious to find out 
just what inscription the card bore. He went 
closer, and read: 

“Most Holy Virgin, in the day of thy glory 
forget not the sorrows of thy children on earth. 

“Have pity on all who suffer and who are in 
pain. 

“Have pity on those who loved and who are 
parted. 

“Have pity on those who are misunderstood, 
on those who are lonely. 

“Have pity on those who are despised and 
forsaken and who tread thorny pathways along 
life’s way. 


DAYS AT THE OLD HOME 


185 


“Have pity on all thy loved children, and 
forget us not when we cry to thee with loving 
voice. 

“O Maria, pray!” 

He was touched by the little prayer. Some¬ 
thing tugged at his heartstrings. He read the 
simple invocations over once, twice. He lingered 
longest on the invocation, “Have pity on those 
who loved and who are parted.” 

He felt that Mrs. Forest was standing close 
beside him, that she too was reading the words. 
She was struck with keenest anguish, remember¬ 
ing one whose portrait hung in the little parlor 
below, all wreathed about in a silken flag and 
who lay sleeping, “somewhere” on a hillside of 
France. 

“Have pity on those who loved, and who are 
parted.” 

In the simplicity of her maternal heart, robbed 
of its dearest treasure, the good old woman won¬ 
dered whether the Blessed Virgin had not, per¬ 
haps, suffered more than other mothers in the 
world. For, when one stopped to consider, her 
Son was not only man, but her God. And she 
had laid Him away in a lonely and dishonored 
tomb, not indeed torn by shot and shell after a 
glorious death in the front-line trenches, with 
loved companions standing by his side, en- 


186 


THE TOWN LANDING 


veloped in all the glory of a just cause, but His 
Sacred Body, formed in hers, was stripped 
ignominiously of its garments and veiled in the 
Blood which streamed from more cruel holes 
than those made by the swift passage of 
shrapnel. Dead after a lingering death, seem¬ 
ingly inglorious, while those who stood around 
Him blasphemed Him, wagging their heads, 
spat upon Him, and opened His adorable side 
with a lance. Ah, surely there was no compar¬ 
ison between the sacrifice of the mothers of the 
world and this majestic, forlorn Virgin who 
stood by the cross of her Son! Stood, did not 
sink to the earth in her weight of woe, but 
bravely sustained the sword of anguish while she 
might comfort Him. 

Well, well,—so thought the little old lady— 
life was strange and difficult to understand. 
Every day one lived new ideals were unfolded 
like flowers, disclosing undreamed-of beauty 
within their waxen chalices, pure gold where 
one had thought to find only the pollen of a 
common flower. 

Over and over in Mrs. Forest’s heart rang the 
sad refrain of Barbara’s prayer to the Sorrow¬ 
ful Virgin; “Have pity on those who loved, and 
who are parted!” 

It did not seem strange after this that 


DAYS AT THE OLD HOME 


187 


Catholics invoked the powerful Virgin and be¬ 
lieved that she heard and answered their 
prayers. 

Francis, absorbed in thought, was recalling a 
little story which he had read in one of the 
current magazines. A poor dolt who had been 
piously brought up in a country village was 
deemed unfit for the things of books. Vainly did 
the good Cure strive to instruct him and to 
fashion him into something which might be of 
use in the world. The iron clamor of war called 
this youth with others out from the pleasant 
fields, away from the village church and far from 
the good old Cure’s side. He followed in the 
restless footsteps of fanatical leaders who were 
hurrying to dethrone an unlucky king. War 
spent its fury. It strewed the streets of Paris 
with mangled and misshapen forms that had 
once been men. It hounded from exile leaders 
who had no greater fault than that they repre¬ 
sented a system which to the people was unjust 
and undesirable. It changed the poor peasant 
lad from a simple unsophisticated boy, content 
with the humble things of life, into a fierce and 
savage man whose yearning was for human 
blood. 

War passed by, and the fury calmed some¬ 
what. The man returned to his native hamlet. 


188 


THE TOWN LANDING 


Everything seemed changed. Had he realized, 
the change was in himself. 

He thought that the village had remained be¬ 
hind in the march of so-called progress. War 
had not penetrated these majestic and kingly 
forests, these white, sweet-smelling roads. In the 
village church the sanctuary lamp still flickered 
as of old. The great change lay in himself. 

He went out into the pleasant fields dotted 
with wild flowers. He did not find any 
particular enjoyment in the recollections of his 
boyhood haunts. Coming suddenly to a turn in 
the hedge, he saw a large crucifix similar to those 
seen at the entrance to many a French village. 
Coming suddenly upon it, the Image seemed 
very real, almost alive. 

The man received a rude shock. All the teach¬ 
ings of his childhood returned to his forsaken 
soul. He had seen men torn by shot and shell, 
he had seen rivers of human blood, and he had 
not turned pale. But now the sight of this in¬ 
animate figure rent his very soul. His knees 
shook. Looking up into the disfigured face, he 
saw that the nail which fastened the right arm 
had been broken off, eaten by rust. The figure 
hung suspended only by the left arm. 

In his childhood he had not been pious, but he 
had cherished the crucifix. It wounded his heart 


DAYS AT THE OLD HOME 


189 


to think that this sacred symbol had suffered neg¬ 
lect at the hands of men. Among the hedge¬ 
rows he found a piece of clinging vine, strong 
and pliable as wire. Laying his helmet and sabre 
on the grass, he reverently climbed up to the 
cross, refastened the arm of the Divine Martyr 
to it, kissed the Feet and crept down. 

The simple tale had singularly touched Dr. 
Somers. The sight of Barbara’s little Crucifix, 
embalmed with flowers gathered by those child¬ 
like hands in the fields of his childhood, touched 
him to the heart, although it brought him bitter¬ 
ness. He felt that Barbara was farther than 
ever away from him because of this. 

He followed the little lady down the stairs in 
silence. Entering the sitting room, he threw 
himself wearily into a chair and rested his head 
upon his hands. 

Mrs. Forest thought, “How like his mother he 
is! Poor, dear lady! It was the crudeness of 
life that weighed on her, that broke her gentle 
heart. It must have driven her to the Catholic 
Church at the last; although just why, I don’t 
understand.” 

The little room seemed to be stifling Francis. 
The pictures on the walls, shrouded in white 
mosquito netting, the chairs covered over with 
flowered cretonne for the summer season, the 


190 


THE TOWN LANDING 


many angles of the ancient carpet, and the 
Venetian gondolas wandering giddily over the 
wall paper—he remembered them all from early 
childhood. 

The sound of merry laughter struck him 
forcibly, and he started up. He crossed the 
room and went to the window that looked out 
over the orchard. 

Barbara was leaning on the garden gate, 
swinging her sunbonnet. Her cheeks were 
aglow with roses that put to blush the pale prin¬ 
cesses of the garden. She was looking into the 
eyes of a tall and stalwart young farm hand, 
who, with flannel shirt slightly opened at the 
neck and bronze arms resting lightly on the 
fence, toyed with the blossoms of the honey¬ 
suckle. 

The little room swung dizzily around Francis. 
Barbara, he thought, could only look that way at 
one in whom she was deeply interested. He had 
not spoken with her since their quarrel on the 
occasion of his last visit that had ended so un¬ 
happily. 

David Lester was a Catholic. The advantage 
was insuperable. He was only a hired man, but 
he was a giant among men, strong, handsome, 
noble, singularly gifted in many ways. What 
did Barbara think of him? 


DAYS AT THE OLD HOME 


191 


Francis was almost beside himself with misery. 
He wondered of what the two were talking. For 
something made David’s expression become very 
pensive, and his long lashes dropped over his sun¬ 
burned cheek. Barbara had ceased laughing and 
was speaking very earnestly to him. Of what? 
Francis would have been surprised to hear the 
conversation. For the girl was saying in low 
tones: 

“David, did you read the incident of how St. 
Alphonsus set off for the Indies? The rector, 
just to test his spirit of obedience, ordered him to 
go to the Indies one wintry evening. Instantly 
Alphonsus, although an old man, set off, without 
hat or cloak. Of course the porter had instruc¬ 
tions not to allow him to pass. Oh, David! 
People to-day would find that ridiculous, per¬ 
haps; for, you see, this is an age of ‘progress.’ 
But to me it’s wonderfully beautiful. It just 
shows that Alphonsus cared for nothing but to 
please God. The weather or other circum¬ 
stances did not enter into his considerations. 
Are you enjoying reading his life?” 

Barbara paused suddenly, as she noticed that 
Dr. Somers’ handsome car was standing outside 
the cottage door. A faint color came to her lips. 
She dreaded to meet him just now. She was 


192 


THE TOWN LANDING 


terribly afraid of herself, knowing how magnetic 
he was, and her own weakness. 

She turned resolutely toward the cottage door, 
and left David gazing after her with something 
akin to reverence. 


XVIII 


HILLCREST 

B arbara was vaguely uneasy. Francis’ 
last visit on the day when David had 
taken her for a ride in the old buzz wagon 
had been far from happy. Mrs. Forest, absent¬ 
ing herself from the sitting room in order to give 
the young people an opportunity to reach a 
better understanding, had but made a bad matter 
worse. Francis had had practically nothing to 
say, and the girl found herself shy and nervous. 
So he had gone away, mentally regretting that 
he had come at all, and vowing to leave Barbara 
to herself for a couple of weeks in order that she 
might realize how much she was missing. Mrs. 
Forest was right in her estimate of the young 
man. He was seriously afflicted with pride, and 
hated to give in to others. 

Barbara wandered idly through the tiny 
rooms of the cottage. She touched with her 
gentle hands many mementos of past genera¬ 
tions ; for the place abounded in them. She spent 

193 


194 


THE TOWN LANDING 


hours curled up in a big rocking chair poring 
over the family albums. Ever and always it was 
the same—^in the slight, quaint figures of Auntie 
Forest’s brothers and uncles and grandfathers 
she saw but one figure, that of Francis. The 
faces all resolved themselves into one face, Fran¬ 
cis’. Everything was Francis, although Barbara 
was furiously angry with herself for caring. 
Sunday passed and he did not come to Meadow 
Lane. She was very uneasy. What if he 
should never come again? 

Barbara’s nature was one which was easily 
satisfied with simple pleasures. In this respect 
she had never quite outgrown her childhood. So 
now the little old lady, seeing with anxious eyes 
that the girl was brooding, and rightly connect¬ 
ing it with Francis, tried in every way to divert 
her. 

Barbara sat for hours with the treasures of the 
little best room in her apron. She looked 
through stereoscopes and saw beautifully and 
impossibly colored flowers,—ladies and gentle¬ 
men, hoop skirts and stovepipe hats, and so on. 
She pored over ancient annals of fishing ports 
where Mrs. Forest’s father had lived, and his an¬ 
cestors before him. She read with feverish 
interest stories of those who toiled in the 
deep and brought forth wondrous treasure in 




HILLCREST 


195 


their nets to be divided among the simple vil¬ 
lagers. She embroidered diligently on bits of 
linen or satin, working all kinds of mistakes in 
her moments of abstraction, and wearying of 
everything. 

Did she tire of the peace and solitude of the 
country? For the blue meadows stretching 
away so uniformly made her inexpressibly 
lonely. The sight of the cows chewing the stems 
of the clover seemed but to accentuate her un¬ 
easiness. She wandered through the fields, 
caressing the wild flowers, making bouquets for 
the cottage and for her ovm little shrines upstairs 
in the blue-and-white chamber. She wove dainty 
chaplets of wild roses for the graves of two whom 
she had never met in life, but who seemed very 
near to her, especially one of them. Through 
them she felt the closeness of eternity, and noth¬ 
ing pleased her more than to fancy that the dead 
were her friends. 

Life flowed on too smoothly, as it seemed. 
Barbara was not one of those restless souls who 
must be among the crowd and be a part of every¬ 
thing that goes on. And yet she loved the pulse 
of life, to touch life, to see it and feel it. The 
chapel at the crest of the hill was a great solace 
during these trying days. And yet she longed 
for the dim old churches of the city, for the quiet 


196 


THE TOWN LANDING 


aisles sometimes strewn with dust, aisles that 
echoed now and anon to the tread of hurrying 
footsteps. She yearned for many things that she 
had left behind. 

Had Barbara been more versed in the things 
of the heart she might have realized that the city 
called to her, not so much because of its many 
colored lights and its fascination, as because 
someone was there whom she had come to need, 
and whose presence meant all the world to her. 
She was angry with Francis sometimes, some¬ 
times angry with herself, and sometimes, with a 
true woman’s fickleness, she loved him the more 
dearly just because of his strong will and the 
hardness with which he treated her. But again, 
like a true little woman, she quickly forgave him, 
and her moments of depression were succeeded 
by hours when hope sang in her heart and all 
the world was fair because of him. 

From behind the closed shutters the girl, 
wandering in the garden, ’ heard the drone of 
Mrs. Forest’s voice as she sang her favorite 
hymn to the doleful accompaniment of the old 
melodeon: 

Throw out the lifeline! 

Someone is drifting away! 

Throw out the lifeline! 

Someone is sinking to-day! 


HILLCREST 


197 


Barbara smiled in spite of herself. Here in 
the quiet village there was not much to incite one 
to wrongdoing. People seemed to vegetate like 
the grass and the herbs. It was an unvaried 
round of petty household tasks and duties, while 
the sun was so golden overhead and the sky like 
turquoise and the flowers enameled the velvet 
fields. 

Mrs. Forest, behind the closed shutters, in the 
simplicity of her motherly heart, pleaded for 
some wanderer on life’s vast ocean. Who could 
tell whether somewhere, in the deep waters of 
contradiction, a restless drifting soul might not 
be drawn to safe harbor by the prayer that rose 
from a simple and trusting heart? Barbara 
thought: How many there are outside the Faith 
who would appreciate it much more than those 
who possess it through no merit of their own! 
The Church had so much security and peace, so 
much beauty and sunlight to offer! How many 
times had she not, in some remote corner of a 
church, watched with wondering, reverent eyes 
the tremendous mysteries being celebrated on the 
altar, where the priest walked to and fro, said a 
few words in Latin, lifted his hands or joined 
them, bent his head or raised it to a White Some¬ 
thing in his fingers, and murmured the desire of 
all the world into the wounded Heart of Christ, 


198 


THE TOWN LANDING 


the great Lover of mankind. Oh, it was all so 
wonderful, so beautiful! if only the whole world 
knew of it! If only just one more soul knew 

of it! Only- But Francis seemed to be as 

far as possible from the Kindly Light of which 
the great Cardinal wrote in pleading accents. 

Barbara wandere'd by herself down the lonely 
village street. The low white-washed fences of the 
farm cottages reached out to a whole wilderness 
of fragrant blossoms and wistful green things. 
Now and then some warm, loving, living crea¬ 
ture crossed her path, looking up into her face to 
solicit a smile of recognition or the gentle pres¬ 
sure of her dainty hand. All the living creatures 
at Meadow Lane knew and trusted Barbara. 
When they were tired or hungry or thirsty they 
invariably turned to her if she was at hand. The 
mother cat would come to deposit her precious 
burden of fur in Barbara’s lap as she sat knitting 
under the old elm trees. Brutus had unfolded to 

I 

her alone the secret hiding place of the big ham- 
bone in the woods behind the farm. Not even 
David had obtained such singular privileges as 
the dainty little princess who ruled the hearts of 
all who came within her gentle influence. 

She turned into a shady lane that ran past the 
old Methodist meeting house on the green. She 
looked curiously at the grim closed shutters, at 



HILLCREST 


199 


the gaunt porch, at the prim steeple, at the ram¬ 
bling line of sheds in the rear for the horses that 
had used to travel from a distance on Sunday 
mornings. Through the windows she glimpsed the 
bare whitewashed walls, unrelieved by any touch 
of color or decoration. Truly there was not much 
beauty in a religion which was- embodied in such 
a lack of all God’s beautiful works, the girl 
thought. Strange that people should strive to 
exclude this beauty, when, as if to satisfy the de¬ 
sires of His children, God had made such a beau¬ 
tiful world, filling it to the brim with loveliness 
and delight. 

Barbara knew that in this ancient temple 
Francis had worshiped in his boyhood. Here 
he had accompanied his gentle and lovely mother 
on Sundays and listened to dull sermons—for she 
thought they probably were dull—and threats 
meted out to those who would not serve. No 
wonder that Francis was not a religious man. 
For his sensitive soul adored beauty, and there 
was little apparent here. 

Barbara continued on her way, moving slowly 
along the pleasant path, putting aside the thickly 
twining bushes with her slender hands. In a few 
moments she came to the old Town Landing, and 
her delighted ears heard the soft lap, lap of the 
ever-moving waters. 



XIX 


PARTNERS 

S UMMER waned, and came October, Month 
of the Angels. In the country the 
leaves here and there took on a gaudy hue. 
The corn had been stripped from the yielding 
stalks that now waved jauntily in the breeze. 
Autumn flowers, hardy and brilliant, succeeded 
their frailer, fairer sisters in the gardens. A 
pensive air seemed to brood over the land. 

In the city things languid freshened up a bit. 
The pavements were no longer blistered by 
strong midsummer suns. Cool east winds sprang 
up more frequently in the late afternoon, bring¬ 
ing out multitudes of the .poor from the tene¬ 
ments to sit upon the sidewalks, the curbings or 
the fire escapes. The peddlers of coal or vege¬ 
tables sang lustily as they lumbered through the 
streets that resounded to the hum of multifarious 
voices. The great hive of the city hummed with 
activity. 

Doctor Somers walked briskly, drinking in the 
cool, damp air, as it was wafted from the harbor. 

200 


PARTNERS 


201 


He walked through Blossom Street, picking his 
way carefully over heaps of straggling babies, 
the children of the foreign-born of every con¬ 
ceivable nationality. 

He had grown slightly paler and thinner, for 
he was working harder of late. He had not 
taken a holiday recently to run out to Hillerest. 

He turned from the narrow street that 
ascended steeply before him and entered an 
alley. He knocked at the door of a poor dwell¬ 
ing, which was immediately opened by a young 
woman in mean garments, with a weeping infant 
in her arms and two emaciated little ones cling¬ 
ing to her skirts. 

Francis ascended a dreary flight of crazy 
stairs and paused on the first landing to knock on 
one of the doors. 

It was opened by a woman whose face was 
tired and whose dress was humble, although scru¬ 
pulously neat and clean. 

“How’s Billy to-day?” asked the doctor. 

“Well, Doctor, he’s not so well. But he 
doesn’t complain. He’s the best little chap in the 
world, so mild and unselfish. But it’s terribly 
hard to see him lying there in pain.” 

Billy had been injured by an automobile some 
two months before, and had just arrived home 
after a weary sojourn at the hospital. Dr. 


202 


THE TOWN LANDING 


Somers had been attending him regularly since 
his coming home. Billy was just thirteen years 
old, and a whole world of natural goodness and 
sweetness about him. Francis sometimes mar¬ 
veled at the quiet self-possession and the heroic 
spirit of the little lad, who suifered intense pain 
at times. 

They had done everything possible for him. 
Francis had given himself unreservedly without 
recompense, for here he recognized a case well 
deserving of charity. The Willetts were pain¬ 
fully poor; the father was dead and the mother 
took in washing to eke out the household pro¬ 
vision. 

Francis had gro'wn very fond of Billy in the 
space of a few short weeks. So now he went into 
the small dark chamber overlooking the back 
alley and bent over the cot with the solicitude of 
a mother. 

Billy, a pathetic little. figure with tumbled 
golden hair, turned a radiant face toward the 
Doctor. There had come to be a singular bond 
between these two so dissimilarly placed in the 
circumstances of life. 

“Well, how goes it, Billy?” Dr. Somers asked 
cheerily. He took up the wasted little hand, that 
should have been strong and brown as those of 
other boys of his age. 


PARTNERS 


203 


‘‘Why, Dr. Somers, I’m feeling just fine. I 
was hoping you’d come to-day.” 

“Any of that old pain in the back?” inquired 
Francis. 

“Well, yes, some. But it might be worse. 
And when I lie perfectly still it isn’t so bad.” 

Dr. Somers drew in his breath sharply. He 
admired the indomitable courage of the little 
fellow, who would never complain of his suffer¬ 
ings. Even now he would not admit that they 
were much. 

A brief examination, during which Billy main¬ 
tained a stoical indifference, although Francis 
Imew that it hurt him, showed that there was 
slight progress, if any. Billy would probably 
never walk without a crutch. He was such a fine 
little lad that Francis’s heart fairly ached at the 
thought of the future. 

“How is she getting on. Doctor?” inquired the 
patient. 

“Why, Billy, she doesn’t get on as fast as we 
would like. I wonder if we couldn’t find another 
specialist who’d have something different in his 
mind.” 

“But,” Billy turned on the pillow to look 
straight into the Doctor’s eyes. Francis care¬ 
fully avoided the look. “But ’twouldn’t be any 


204 


THE TOWN LANDING 


use, would it? He couldn’t do more than you’re 
doing, could he?” 

“He might.” It was terribly hard to be 
evasive with such a straightforward little soul, 
Francis wished that he could lie, lie like any¬ 
thing, so he thought to himself. But Billy would 
find out, and then . . . 

“Well,” he replied, “perhaps it’s just as well 
to let things move slowly.” 

Francis found it exceedingly hard to play the 
game to the end. The end was, for Billy, con¬ 
demnation to a fate which would set him apart 
from the rest of men, from boys of his own age. 
He would be forced to drag through a useless, 
inactive existence, scarcely the portion of a man 
in these racing days of progress. Francis suf¬ 
fered keenly as he sat by the poor little bed pon¬ 
dering on the course to pursue. The actual 
suffering of the separation from Barbara made 
him unconsciously more gentle, more tender in 
his ministrations to those who were in pain. 

The poor, tawdry furnishings of the room 
attracted his attention to-day. Over the mantel, 
which was draped in bedraggled white lace, was 
a highly colored representation of the Sacred 
Heart of Jesus. The face seemed to gaze right 
at you, through you; the eyes to pierce your very 
soul. It was a kindly Face, a compassionate 


PARTNERS 


205 


Face, yet a Face which reproached and yearned 
toward you. Francis saw that the Heart was 
exposed on the breast and that it was encircled 
with a crown of thorns and emitted flames of fire 
at its orifice. . . . 

It was the first time that he had seen a repre¬ 
sentation of the Adorable Heart of the Saviour, 
vast ocean of mercy, tenderness and loving com¬ 
passion. He felt that he was alone in the little 
room and that everything else had suddenly van¬ 
ished save this unusual picture. 

Francis had never before thought of the Heart 
of the Man-God. The heart was the symbol of the 
affections, the seat of love, of the virtues, of the 
passions. When pain or disappointment came 
to a man, a sword of natural affliction pierced 
this heart, making itself felt in a natural and 
physical manner. In moments of violent emo¬ 
tion, as of fear, pleasure, anguish and the like, 
it was the heart that felt and experienced the 
depths of feeling. 

So the Heart of Jesus had probed the depths 
of men’s unworthy and fickle hearts and in Its 
own adorable recesses had felt the prick of the 
sword of indifference, of distrust and of aban¬ 
donment. 

Francis noted that there were printed words 


206 


THE TOWN Lx4NDING 


beneath the pieture. Stooping forward, he read 
them. 

“Learn of Me, because I am meek and humble 
of Heart.’’ 

With hands idly folded, he heard the reproach, 
the lesson from the recesses of this loving 
Saviour’s heart. Was it true, what the message 
implied? Was pride indeed the root of all his 
misery? Was pride the foundation stone of so 
many months of pain, loneliness and distrust of 
all men? Something had always been wanting to 
his complete enjoyment of all his blessings. He 
had never truly known perfect peace such as this 
child here by his side, little sufferer, had ex¬ 
perienced. What was the reason? 

Looking at the wasted form of the boy, Billy, 
he suddenly felt that the human body partici¬ 
pated in the holiness of the soul that gives it life 
and warmth. And of all the organs of that 
body, surely the heart participated most inti¬ 
mately in the holiness of the soul. Francis felt 
that he had come into a very sacred place; that, 
unworthy though he was, he had been admitted 
to a sanctuary. 

Billy was speaking, and he turned to listen. 

“Doctor, I’ve been thinking of something, just 
while you’ve been here. What if-” 



PARTNERS 


207 


Francis shuddered and closed his eyes. He 
dreaded what was coming. 

“What if I should never walk again?” 

“Why, Billy, that's not being a brave soldier. 
Why not look on the jolly side? Why— 
why-” 

“Because,” the young earnest face seemed to 
glow as with a light of some old saint, “because I 
don't seem to get any stronger. And of course 
I know that all over the world there are crippled 
boys. Look at the fellows in the World War! 
And there are blind people, and deaf and dumb 
people and people without arms and legs. And 
God doesn't cure them.” 

Francis was silent, ashamed that with all his 
superior knowledge he could offer no solution of 
the Mystery of Suffering. 

He said somewhat harshly, gazing toward the 
picture on the mantel: 

“Why?” For he realized that Billy knew 
why. 

“Because—because—there’s something better 
in store for them,” said Billy reverently. 
“And because, of itself suffering isn't bad. 

Doctor, if I thought that- There have been 

lots of saints, you see, who asked for sufferings. 
They couldn't bear to be without them.'' 

“Asked for suffering?” asked Francis in a low 





208 


THE TOWN LANDING 


voice. ‘‘That’s odd.” He felt very small and in¬ 
significant beside this cripple boy from the heart 
of the slums. 

“Yes, asked for it. Lots of them. And some 
of them asked for martyrdom. Death, you 
know.” 

“For martyrdom—death!” Francis sounded to 
himself like a sorry echo wandering in a maze 
without sense of place or direction. 

“Yes. Right in our own day, too. Say, 
Doctor, did you ever hear of Father Willie 
Doyle, of the Society of Jesus? I’m a name¬ 
sake of his—Bill, you know. I’m mighty glad, 
too. Well, he was a chaplain in the World 
War.” Billy’s pale face glowed with a rosy light. 
“He was a saint long before he was a martyr, 
though. He used to rise in the middle of the 
night and walk two miles barefoot in reparation 
for the sins of other souls. He used to kneel in 
the cellar at midnight in order to suffer from the 
cold. And sometimes he said the beads with his 
arms extended in the form of a cross. He used 
to press his heart against the tabernacle door to 
let Our Lord hear the beats of its love. He was 
a wonder. I’ll say! I’d like to be like him —a 
hero! What do you think. Doctor? I’ve got a 
relic from Holy Ireland. A priest gave it to me 
after I got run over.” 


PARTNERS 


209 


Billy reverently took from a fold of his shirt 
a tiny piece of leather worked with embroidered 
edge by some loving and sympathetic hand. 

“It’s a piece of the pillow Father Willie used 
in the trenches*” he said proudly. “Gee, I’m in 
luck I guess he didn’t sleep much on it, though. 
I’ll say he was my ideal! What do you think, 
Doctor? When I was so sick, just after the acci¬ 
dent, and didn’t seem to care whether I got well, 
I kind of think this relic saved my life.” 

Francis listened dumbly, wonderingly. Was 
it absurd, amazing, that he felt a strange inex¬ 
plicable interest in this young Irish Jesuit, the 
Passion Flower of Ireland’s contribution to the 
Great War? Francis had never realized that 
the Catholic Church was so tender, so intimate as 
these outpourings of a pure boyish heart re¬ 
vealed. 

He suddenly remembered Barbara’s little 
Crucifix all embedded in fiowers. He felt that 
he had been cruel, misunderstanding, and that 
he had caused her gentle heart needless pain. 
Something like a sob rose in his throat. 

“Doctor Somers,” said Billy, “I might as well 
let you in on something before my mother comes 
in again. You know I’m never going to be any 
better, don’t you?” 

“Why,” Francis stopped. He could say noth- 


210 


THE TOWN LANDING 


ing. He felt that strange mysterious presences 
filled the stuffy little tenement room. They rep¬ 
resented the souls of those who had suffered and 
sacrificed—for love. 

'‘Doctor/’ whispered Billy feverishly, “I 
offered myself as a victim if God willed—like 
Father Willie did. And I did this for some soul 
that is wandering in darkness right now.” 

The little voice died into stillness. Billy, 
weakened by the extra exertion, lay back on the 
pillows with faint drops of moisture gathered on 
his white brow. After a moment he continued: 

“The priest who comes over to see me every 
two weeks brought Father Willie’s life for me to 
read. I’ve only read a few minutes at a time. 
I didn’t tell even him. Father Foley, I mean. 
Something told me to tell you. You’ve been 
good to me, and I’ll never forget it. I only wish 
I could repay you. But we’re awfully poor. 
Mother has to take in washing to keep things 
going. Some folks might think it was queer I 
was satisfied to be laid up when she has to work 
so hard. But God squares things up. He will 
take care of us somehow and bring good out of 
it all.” 

Francis drew the book from the foot of Billy’s 
bed, and with a feeling that he was treading holy 


PARTNERS 


211 


ground, opened by chance toward the middle. 
And he read in large black letters: 

“Two Solemn Moments. 

“The end of that life which God gave to be 
spent in His service. A solemn moment when 
we lie down for the last time and look back upon 
our life which is gone forever—a precious talent 
entrusted to us, not to misuse or bury in the 
ground like slothful servants, but to spend to 
good use till the Master comes. 

“The end of a year. Another milestone of our 
journey to eternity. Just three hundred and 
sixty-five days of a life so short passed away. 
All of us have taken a big stride toward the 
hour of our death and, let us not forget it, the 
happiness and reward of heaven. 

“Last mile of march. Tighten knapsack on 
back, pull ourselves together and step out more 
hardily for the last mile. For many the last mile 
of life. We shall make it worthy of Him so good 
to us; so that we may exclaim: T have fought a 
good fight,’ done my duty to my God. A crown 
of glory.” 

And again, on the next page Francis read: 

“The Wedding Garment. Find the pond of 
the Sacred Blood, there to wash stains away. 
Hell is full of men who said, ‘Later on.’ To save 
one’s soul or lose it matters much.” 


212 


THE TOWN LANDING 


“Billy,” said Francis almost feverishly, “say, 
little Buddy, what would you think if we 
entered into partnership about this thing? 
Marching to grab that reward, I mean; you with 
your knapsack, and I with mine? You suffering 
in one way and I in another. For, Billy, IVe got 
a harder fight than you, all told. You see, Billy, 
IVe passed lots of white milestones and never 
thought where the way led. I just marched on, 
high and mighty, proud as—as the devil, Billy 
boy. And God knows IVe suffered for my 
fault. What do you say about the partnership? 
Will you sign up? Then we can have some fun 
watching the enemy. What do you know? I 
shouldn’t wonder if I could finally catch up with 
—her.” 

“Catch up with who. Doc?” queried Billy bliss¬ 
fully unconscious of his lapse of grammar. 

“Y^ith Oh—er-' Billy, there’s a skele¬ 
ton in the closet, my boy, that’s all. Keep out or 
you’ll get scared to death. Father Willie Doyle 
was some character. I’ll say!” Francis felt 
strangely boyish since a few moments ago. He 
lapsed easily into the linguistic characteristics of 
the day. 

Billy was a shrewd little saint, as all the saints 
were. He thought, “I’ll bet it’s a girl!” 

“Billy,” said Francis, as he rose to go, “er- 





PARTNERS 


213 


I suppose I’d better borrow that book of yours 
just for a couple of days. To—to kind of get 
my bearings on the line of march, don’t you 
know. You see, Billy, if I’m going to crawl out 
through the darkness and right into the mouth of 
shot and shell, I’ve got to know where the mines 
are laid. Don’t you say so?” 

“Sure,” said Billy, and saw his beloved book 
depart with regret, but willing to sacrifice its 
loved companionship to his new partner. 

Dr. Somers went out through the kitchen all 
redolent with steam from the busy tubs. He 
talked to the little mother breezily for a few 
seconds, chucked the baby under the chin and 
went out into the mellow sunshine from the 
presence of one of God’s truest little saints. 

His heart was singularly empty somehow, al¬ 
though he was in comparative peace. Although 
he could not understand, it was good that it was 
empty, for now there was more room in his soul 
for God. 

He did not go directly home. Instead he took 
a turn in the direction of old St. Joseph’s. Com¬ 
ing upon the open door just at the turn of the 
road, he hesitated a moment. Then half fear¬ 
fully, like a wanderer who returns a prodigal to 
his father’s house, half uncertain of his reception. 


214 


THE TOWN LANDING 


he went in and threw himself on his knees be¬ 
neath the silent watchful lamp. 

Francis did not pray consciously in words. 
He just knelt quietly in the gloaming, and lis¬ 
tened to the beating of a Heart behind a little 
door of gold. 

How long he remained so he never knew. But 
when he left the church the moon was out and a 
few baby stars blinked far up among the clouds. 

He resolutely turned the corner of Allen 
Street and rang the bell on the rectory door. 

A priest was passing through the lower hall as 
he entered. Francis, with a throb of gratitude, 
recognized the young priest whom he had met 
that night of his first visit to old St. Joseph’s and 
who had addressed him in so friendly a manner. 

‘T—I’ve come to talk to you about—my 
mother,” Francis stammered. 

They went into a private room and closed the 
door. 



XX 


THE TOWN LANDING 

B arbara, taking her solitary way along 
the quiet village street of Hillcrest, passed 
neat gardens set before prim cottages, 
old gardens where the tall sunflowers caressed 
one another, where quaint old ladies nodded to 
one another over low garden walls, and white 
fleecy cloudlets drifted almost over the tips of 
the orchard trees. 

She was sorely troubled. She had inquired at 
the post office whether there was any mail for 
her. Sometimes Dr. Somers dropped a note or 
card when he was too busy to come in person. 
There was no note, no card. 

At this rather melancholy season of the year— 
for the gray days of autumn were approaching— 
it was easy to look on the gloomy side of things. 
Everything seemed to be drifting away from 
Barbara, and she felt very lonely. In another 
week she was to return to the city to take a 
position in one of the fashionable modiste shops 

215 


216 


THE TOWN LANDING 


at a fair salary. The future looked bright, and 
yet she was very ill at ease. 

The thought of leaving Hillcrest made her 
shed a few quiet tears now and then when its 
little mistress was not looking. It was not so 
much because of the kindness which had been 
shown to her here, although she was grateful for 
all. It was more because this charmed spot was 
inseparably associated with the thought of one 
who had brought her so much happiness, only 
to crown it all by misery. The hours spent with 
him would never be forgotten. 

And David. Barbara realized that David 
meant much to her also, but in another way than 
Dr. Somers. David had been a big, kind, tactful 
brother, a guide, a confidant, one whose sym¬ 
pathy had never failed her. She realized that 
from his earnest Christian example she had im¬ 
bibed something very noble and sweet. David 
had helped her, as she in turn had helped him. 

Poor David! Rich David! So thought Bar¬ 
bara, almost envying him the peace of soul that, 
in spite of his loneliness, consoled and enriched 
him as no other gifts could do. 

Bells called to one another through the drowsy 
twilight. The girl loved the sound of them and 
paused to listen. In the meadows little singing 
creatures were flitting busily in the grass, piping 


THE TOWN LANDING 


217 


their quaint distinctive notes of rejoicing. 
Nature was so much at peace! It was only 
human creatures who were unquiet. 

Barbara turned down the little lane that led to 
the Town Landing, hoping, wishing that she 
might find David there. Shadows were creep¬ 
ing over the meadow grasses as she picked her 
way daintily along. The first night dews were 
falling. The flowers had closed their waxen eye¬ 
lids, heavy with the beauty of the world, and 
gone fast asleep. 

She came to the brink of the river. Lap, lap— 
the little ripples talked to her heavy heart with 
infinite sympathy and understanding. The fra¬ 
grant bushes, laden with the dying blooms of the 
year, drooped low to whisper: “We, like fairest 
hopes are passing, but we shall bloom again next 
year.” 

Everything seemed to be wide awake to 
Barbara’s presence, and striving to console her. 

David was there. . . . 

Bareheaded, with arms folded, he stood look¬ 
ing out toward the sunset, over the darkling ex¬ 
panse of moving water. The dip of paddles 
came faintly on the wind; the air was musty with 
odors of thyme and water lilies. It was nature’s 
secret witching hour and this her trysting place. 


218 


THE TOWN LANDING 


“O, David!’’ said Barbara. The sound of her 
own voice almost frightened her. . . . 

David turned quickly. His face brightened. 

“Barbara!” he said. “I did not hear you . . . 
but then, I was thinking. . . . It’s a wonder¬ 
ful night, and it seems to me of all spots in the 
world this must be the most beautiful! Don’t 
you think so?” 

“A penny for your thoughts, David! Come! 
Tell me of what you were thinking just before 
I spoke and spoiled your lovely dream. . . . 
For of course you were dreaming. One could 
hardly help it on such a night and—here.” 

David’s face grew sober. He looked very 
strong, very noble in his present mood. Evi¬ 
dently something serious had been in his mind 
a moment before, the reflection of which still 
rested on his features, 

He said: “Barbara, I’ve got something 
strange to tell you. That is, it seems strange to 
me, almost too unreal, too sublime. At first it 
frightened me. I could not tell—even you. I 
tried to push it away, but it came again, stronger, 
giving me no peace. And then, when I finally 
admitted it, other temptations and misgivings 
came. . . . But finally I think, I hope—I have 
conquered them. . . . What would you think—- 




THE TOWN LANDING 


219 


what would you say, Barbara, if I were to tell 
you that I-” 

The whole world stood still just then, so it 
seemed to Barbara. . . . The wind in the tree 
tops died to a whisper and even the birds forgot 
their song. . . . 

“That I had decided to—to offer the rest of my 
life to God—as St. Alphonsus Rodriguez did, to 
be a lay brother in his beloved Society . . . that 
is, if I am accepted. ... I realize now that it must 
have been planned for me all along. It was you, 
though, who made it clear to me. But for you I 
would perhaps have spent the rest of my days 
toiling here in the fields, always a little restless 
and dissatisfied because I had not quite reached 
my own place. Tell me, Barbara,—that you are 
glad!” 

Barbara’s quick tears were the only answer to 
the question. 

David continued in a low voice: “Of course I 
know there will be times when I shall miss the 
things I’ve been used to, the freedom and all that. 
But I know, too, that I’m going to be very 
happy by and by. Too happy, perhaps. For 
I believe that great happiness has its dangers. 
It’s good to suffer at least part of the time. St. 
Ignatius tells us that.” 

“David,” Barbara said softly: “when you are 



220 


THE TOWN LANDING 


in your Own Place, do not forget me in your 
good prayers. I’m so little and weak, David. 
I don’t know when to trust myself. Just now 
I’m lonely and discouraged. Soon I’ll be going 
back to the city where perhaps I can drown out 
the pain in my heart in the noise and bustle. But 
I’ll never, never forget that our friendship— 
yours and mine—was so beautiful and unspoiled, 
that nothing ever marred or hurt it in any way. 
Isn’t it strange, David, that we learn so hard 
that the things we keep just for God are the 
only things that do not hurt us sometime? They 
always bring peace and joy, even the recollection 

of them. While other affections-” She 

sighed heavily and cast down her eyes. 

‘T know, Barbara. We all have our own pe¬ 
culiar trials. Sometimes I’ve wondered if I 
could be happy without the things that most men 
prize—a home and a little family of my own. 
But now I understand that it is a high privilege 
when God offers us a little portion of His Cross. 
For me the pain will be loneliness—for a time— 
Nothing else will be hard. But then, I can think 
how, in all the great crises of His earthly life, 
Christ suffered alone. It makes all sweet and 
easy, even in anticipation. But cheer up! Be 
a brave girl! Who knows,—perhaps more of the 
merit of my choice belongs to you rather than to 





THE TOWN LANDING 


221 


me? At least a large share is yours. I will never 
forget you, Barbara. I am sure that something 
very good is coming to you, too. Perhaps it may 
be nearer than you think. Do you remember the 
passage in your beautiful life of St. Alphonsus, 
where it speaks of the response that he made to 
one who had undertaken the defense of religion: 
‘Be of good heart, Senor Viceroy. You are 
serving a good Lady, who will not fail to repay 
you both here and in Heaven!’ I think that we 
always obtain some consolation for every little 
good we do here. I realize it in my own case, 
and I feel sure that you will in yours.” 

As David ceased speaking, a footstep sounded 
along the path leading to the brink of the river. 

It was Francis Somers. He flushed when he 
recognized David, bowed politely and shook 
hands with Barbara. 

He said awkwardly: “I’ve been very busy of 
late. Mrs. Forest told me that I’d probably find 
you here.” 

Barbara replied sweetly: “I’m sure. Dr. 
Somers, that you are always very busy—doing 
good to others. I—we looked for you, didn’t 
we, David? We almost thought that you’d 
forgotten us.” 

It was an embarrassing moment for Francis. 


222 


THE TOWN LANDING 


He wished that David were just then a thousand 
miles away. 

They talked of commonplace things for a few 
moments, then Barbara said: 

“David has just told me some wonderful news- 
I’m sure he’ll be pleased to tell you, too, so that 
you may congratulate him.” Then, seeing that 
David was trying to find words to describe his 
great vocation to one who could hardly be ex¬ 
pected to sympathize, Barbara continued: 
“David is going to be a religious. . . . a Jesuit. 
. . . isn’t it wonderful?” 

“I’m going to be God’s hired man,” David 
said calmly. “I realize that I won’t be of much 
use to anyone, except to do the chores and the 
like. . . . But at least I can fill in a little corner 
somewhere. . . 

Strange as it seemed to himself, in that mo¬ 
ment Francis felt very small, very insignificant 
beside this simple and unlettered son of the soil. 
Like a vague presentiment of something learned 
in childhood at his mother’s knee and long since 
forgotten, came the words that he had read be¬ 
neath the picture in the home of a little cripple 
boy: “Learn of Me, because I am meek and 
humble of Heart!” 

Francis held out his hand. “Congratula^ 
tions!” he said with a fervor that could not be 


THE TOWN LANDING 


223 


doubted. '‘Of course it is all beyond me. . . . 
I’m too worldly to grasp the principle. . . . But 
I know it’s a big sacrifice . . . and I’m glad there 
are some men who are willing to make it. . . * 
Good luck, and I hope you get a lot of happiness 
out of your new life!” 

“Thank you for your good wishes, Dr. 
Somers,” David replied with quiet dignity. “I’m 
sure you are very kind. Now, if you and Miss 
Barbara will excuse me. I’ll be going back to see 
if Mrs. Forest needs me for anything.” 

They watched David’s tall figure swinging up 
the path until it disappeared in the bushes. Then 
Francis said humbly, drawing Barbara’s little 
hand within his own: 

“Barbara, won’t you forgive me for all the 
pain I caused you? I’ve been a blind fool,—but 
I see my folly now. It’s all plain to me. I have 
suffered, too, suffered very greatly, for I prize 
your friendship very highly . . . more than any¬ 
thing else in my life. But I have almost found 
peace. You are going to be very much sur¬ 
prised when I tell you something. ...” 

And then Francis told her briefly of his little 
boy saint, Billy, and of his holy namesake. 
Father Willie Doyle, S.J. “I’ve been reading 
Father Willie’s wonderful life, Barbara,” he said 
eagerly. “At first I couldn’t believe that there 


224 


THE TOWN LANDING 


were men like him—on earth—in our day. I 
couldn’t realize that men could long for suffer¬ 
ing, even embrace it joyfully, in order to attain 
a higher degree of Divine Love. Have you read 
the book? No? Then you will be able to ap¬ 
preciate it, even better than I can—yet. Listen 
to this. ... I copied a paragraph for medita¬ 
tion to sort of feed on. . . . I’m trying to absorb 
it, to steep myself in it ... and find peace, if 
such a thing is possible to one so selfish and 
worldly as I’ve been. ...” 

Francis read to the wondering girl: ‘T have 
had the feeling that since the world is growing 
so rapidly worse and worse and God has lost His 
hold, as it were, on the hearts of men, He is look¬ 
ing all the more earnestly and anxiously for big 
things from those who are faithful to Him still. 
He cannot, perhaps, gather a large army round 
His standard, but He wants everyone in it to be 
a Hero, absolutely and lovingly devoted to Him; 
if only we could get inside that magic circle of 
generous souls, I believe there is no grace He 
would not give us to help on the work He has 
so much at heart, our personal sanctification.” 

“I never thought there was anything so beau¬ 
tiful in life,” Francis said earnestly, as he folded 
the bit of paper and replaced it carefully in his 
pocket. ‘‘Why is it, Barbara, that God leaves so 


THE TOWN LANDING 


225 


many souls in the dark, and for so long, while to 
others, like David Lester, He clearly shows the 
whole beautiful design of life’s tapestry, each 
color and pattern in its own place? It’s His mys¬ 
terious way, I suppose, and some day we shall 
know.” 

Barbara flushed with joy. She recalled an¬ 
other day when this same young man before her 
had poured forth his sentiments in far different 
strain. Like an eager little bird, she fluttered 
nearer to him, peering into his face while she 
strove to make out the tremendous mystery. 
This young man was surely a miracle of Divine 
Grace! 

‘T’ll say that Father Willie was a wonderful 
man,” Francis went on enthusiastically. “He has 
changed my whole outlook on life. What would 
you say if I told you that I sat up one whole 
night reading the book, and could hardly lay it 
down until I had finished the last account of him. 
. . . lying somewhere near the Cross Roads of 
Frezenburg, waiting, with his boys of the 48tli 
Brigade, for the Great Reveille! 

“Oh, it’s a wonderful thing to one who has 
been all wrapped up in self, gloomy and cynical, 
to come out into the sunlight of a soul like this! I 
can understand now how the whole world loves 
and reverences a Saint! And I feel that I 


226 


THE TOWN LANDING 


understand more clearly, how God is calling me 
to follow where He leads, without questioning 
or hesitation: ‘Quid ad te? Tu Me sequere!’ 
And so, Barbara, I shall try to follow. 

“I’m going to take instructions from a young 
priest at old St. Joseph’s in the West End,” 
Francis continued. “It was he who first showed 
me a kindness when one night I had strayed 
through morbid curiosity into the basement. Of 
course many things will be hard. But, like 
Father Willie and my little crippled Bill—I’m 
going to fight bravely!” 

Just then, close to their heads, a little bird 
burst forth into a perfect paroxysm of song. 
He sang until it seemed as if the delicate throat 
must burst with the mightiness of the effort. It 
was just like a great Te Deum there in the lovely 
temple, of the outdoor world. 

The light wind wafted a scent of fragrance 
to the two standing side by side in the meadow. 
The sound of the restless water, sucking among 
the green rushes, was like the low incessant song 
of some tiny living creature. 

Francis, manlike, was absorbed in his new¬ 
found happiness, dreaming of the future and 
new joys of soul and intellect which it should un¬ 
fold. . . . Beyond that he had no immediate 
thought. 


THE TOWN LANDING 


227 


And Barbara: Sharing as only a pure and 
self-sacrificing soul can share in the resurrection 
of one near and dear to her, forgetful of self and 
unmindful of the destiny that might lie ahead 
. . . her cup of happiness seemed full. And 
whether, in the distant years, her way might lie 
close beside that of the young man beside her, 
and in the joys of human love she might receive 
a little foretaste of the joys of those who are re¬ 
united in Heaven,—or whether the unfolding of 
the Infinite plans might yet point a more perfect 
way of renunciation for her beloved,—in the per¬ 
fect bliss of the present moment, Barbara re¬ 
signed all solicitude, even all desire. It was the 
old sweet abnegation of St. Alphonsus: “I am« 
coming. Lord!” 

So Barbara and Francis stood at the river’s 
marge gazing into the distance in perfect tran¬ 
quillity. And as they stood, a shadowy canoe 
darted out from beneath the drooping willows. 
Bravely silhouetted against the farther shore, the 
little craft bore swiftly on their course two 
solitary figures into the sunset. 


THE END 



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